Design J is the work of a comics author. Ville Tietäväinen is a Finnish graphic designer, illustrator and graphic novelist, and the proposal is built the way a narrative sequence is built: one story told over six instalments.
| Design letter | J |
|---|---|
| Theme | Rivers and birds |
| Designer | Ville Tietäväinen |
| Based in | Finland |
Design J — Ville Tietäväinen. Complete family of six denominations, fronts and reverses. Design proposal only: it does not show an issued or approved euro banknote.
Who he is
Tietäväinen published his first comic book, Linnut ja meret, in 2003. His best known work, Näkymättömät kädet — published in English as Invisible Hands — appeared in 2011 and won the Finnish Graphic Novel Finlandia Prize. He works across illustration, graphic design and long-form comics.
What the proposal shows
The series follows a river from a mountain source towards the open sea, with the water moving closer to the coast as the denomination rises. Each note carries one of the six selected European bird species in its own habitat: the white stork flies over a meandering river on the €50, the pied avocet stands at a river mouth on the €100, and the northern gannet crosses open sea on the €200.
Two devices hold the family together. The security foils are used as part of the story, showing successive phases of the river rather than an abstract pattern, and on the reverses the outlines of European institutional buildings merge with the wings of the birds.
Where it sits in the process
The ECB published the ten shortlisted families on 23 July 2026 and ran a public survey until 21 September. A single design is expected to be chosen around the end of 2026, combining the jury’s conclusions, a technical assessment and the survey results. Everything published so far is a proposal.
