Medals for Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics unveiled ahead of next year's Games
The medals, created by the Italian State Mint and Polygraphic Institute (IPZS), will use recycled metal recovered from production waste, and will be created in induction furnaces powered by renewable energy, organizers explained. The medals are designed with two halves to represent both Olympic and Paralympic values, organizers revealed.
Italian athletes Federica Pellegrini, who is a double Olympic medalist and Italy's most successful swimmer, and Francesca Porcellato, the winner of 15 Paralympic medals after appearances in 13 Summer and Winter Games, accompanied the medals by boat to the ceremony at Venice's Palazzo Balbi on the Canal Grande.
'The medals we have created to celebrate the Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games represent the mastery and excellence of Italian design. Each one is a unique piece, the result of craftsmanship and innovation,' Paolo Perrone, President of the IPZS, said in a statement released by organizers.
'The Milano Cortina 2026 medals place the athlete at the center of the story, expressing the universality of sport, the struggle, and the emotion of victory,' he added.
The Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics will take place from February 6-22, followed by the Paralympic Winter Games, scheduled from March 6-15.
Next year's Games mark the Winter Olympics' return to Europe, with the event having been hosted by Pyeongchang, South Korea in 2018 and the Chinese city of Beijing staging the Games in 2022.
Ski mountaineering, where athletes will ascend and descend a mountain in Bormio, in the Valtellina valley, using a mixture of on foot and on ski techniques, will make its debut at the Games.
Italy has twice hosted Winter Olympics in the past – Cortina in 1956 and Turin in 2006 – but it will be the first held in Milan.
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