Bridges, artefacts and a host of new security features will grace the new series of bank notes when they enter circulation
When the cashier hands you your change next month, don’t be surprised if the familiar Danish kroner notes look different.
The central bank, Nationalbanken, will gradually start introducing a range of newly designed bank notes from 11 August right through to 2011.
The hunt for a designer for the new notes began three years ago, with the bank inviting eight well-known Danish artists to submit their ideas. It requested that all potential designs include the motif of bridges; not surprising for a country with so many islands.
The choice came down to the final two – Karin Birgitte Lund and Kaspar Bonnen. While Bonnen mixed the bridge motif with more modern Danish icons such as windmills and interior design, Lund won the central bank over when she went the opposite route and looked to history for her inspiration.
‘We were given the bridges as a requirement by Nationalbanken, but I thought it was beautiful to have the bridges representing the present and archaeological antiquities representing the past,’ said Lund to The Copenhagen Post.
The Samsø-based modern artist is also educated in the field of graphics, but designing banknotes was something of a first for her.
‘When I was chosen it was surreal, but I was also extremely happy and proud and felt a great responsibility to design them,’ said Lund. ‘I’m used to having a free pass when it comes to art and choosing my own images, but of course there were a lot of requirements from the bank’.
In addition to the notes showcasing Lund’s new designs, they will also contain enhanced security features to help prevent forgery. A unique window thread with a moving wave pattern is being introduced for the first time, as well as retaining familiar features like watermarks and holograms.
According to the central bank counterfeit notes are not as big a problem in Denmark as in other European countries and forgeries on the whole have dropped dramatically in the last few years. In 2003, there were 1,239 fake notes in circulation compared to 517 last year.
The first of the new batch to hit the streets will be the 50 kroner note, and while it will feature images of the Sallingsund Bridge and the intricately carved stone age clay vessel from Skarpsalling, it will also retain the familiar violet colour of the current note.
Together with a team of engravers and graphic designers from the bank, Lund chose antiquities that were found in the neighbouring areas of the bridges to adorn the new notes.
The prehistoric antiquities represent when Denmark was first founded and I have chosen some very fine and unique pieces. Some of them weren’t created in Denmark, but came here from other countries, which creates links with the rest of Europe.’
The five new notes will be introduced between now and May 2011, with the central bank swapping out the old notes and destroying them. Nationalbanken is likely to achieve this in quite a short time frame, just as it did the last time the bank notes were changed; half of them were removed from circulation within three months.
Lund has her original draft sketches as a memento of her contribution to the redesigned currency, but she has ruled out being given some of the first official samples from the central bank.
‘I think I’ll have to go down to the local bank to get them like everyone else,’ Lund said with a smile.
