Newborn monument

Newborn is a giant sculpture made of the letters N-E-W-B-O-R-N, standing in front of the Palace of Youth and Sports in Pristina, the capital of Kosovo. It was unveiled on 17 February 2008, the very day Kosovo declared its independence from Serbia.

The letters are 3 meters tall and the whole word is about 24 meters long. Every year around Independence Day it is repainted with a new design, so it never looks the same two years in a row. It measures about 3 by 24 by 0.9 meters and is set in a bold typeface called DIN Black. News outlets around the world reported its unveiling.

Why the word 'Newborn'?

Kosovo's designer Fisnik Ismaili made it together with the advertising agency Ogilvy Kosova. They chose one simple English word that people anywhere could understand, to say that a new country had just been born.

Its first coat of paint was bright yellow, a color picked to echo the blue-and-yellow of the new flag and of Europe. The sculpture was finished and set up in only ten days of round-the-clock work.

A monument that changes every year

After the first yellow, Newborn was painted with the flags of the countries that recognised Kosovo, and since then people have repainted it with new pictures each year. It has also been signed by the president and prime minister at its unveiling.

It weighs about 9 tons and is 0.9 meters deep. News photos of it reached newspapers around the world, including the front page of The New York Times.

On the globe

The model shows the giant block letters spelling NEWBORN in Pristina.