5 Euros Specimen

The first euro banknotes entered circulation on 1 January 2002, but specimens from the preceding year exist because the ECB distributed pre-production examples to central banks, financial institutions, and law enforcement agencies across the eurozone for training and authentication purposes. Specimen notes carry distinctive overprints and perforations that render them non-negotiable.

Robert Kalina, an Austrian designer working at the Oesterreichische Nationalbank, won the internal ECB design competition in 1996. His architecture theme — windows and gateways on the obverse, bridges on the reverse — was chosen partly because it depicts no real structure, deliberately avoiding national favoritism among the twelve original adopting states.