There have been a number of attempts to redesign US currency, which I’ll readily admit looks old and drab next to that of many other countries (but which also demonstrates that beauty does not always equate to utility or value, but that’s a completely different issue).
The Dollar ReDe$ign Project brings many of those attempts into a central location, and it’s interesting to scroll through the wide range of variations put forth by designers.
The design firm of Dowling Duncan provides one of the more innovative approaches, with a vertical layout (based, the company says, on research into how we actually use currency) and different lengths for different denominations. The latter would solve one of the great pressing problems of currency, and that’s how to make it easier for sight-impaired people to distinguish among the different denominations of bills. But, of course, putting a living president on a bill is simply not going to fly, for any number of reasons. Nevertheless, their attempt at tying each bill’s amount to a symbolic historic reference (e.g. $50 = the 50 states of the Union) is laudable.
Then, there are the designs put forth by Mark Scott, a Brit (many of the designs are submitted by non-US residents apparently eager to help drag our currency into the 21st century). Sensing the inevitability of ubiquitous corporate sponsorship, he’s replaced the usual political and historical references with symbols representing iconic American brands, such as Coca-Cola, Wal-Mart, and the NFL. I’m especially fond of the $50 Apple bill, although I’m sure Steve Jobs would prefer that it appear on a $100,000 note.
There are scores of designs on this site, some of them quite whimsical (including a 10 cent note with the inscription “Brother, Can You Spare A Dime?”).
Hat tip: Subtraction