The FIFA World Cup Trophy: Design, Materials and Half a Century of Lifts

The original World Cup trophy, designed by French sculptor Abel Lafleur for the 1930 inaugural tournament in Uruguay, was made of gold-plated sterling silver on a lapis lazuli base. It stood 35 cm tall and weighed 3.8 kg. Lafleur's design depicted Nike, the Greek goddess of victory, holding an octagonal vessel above her head. The trophy was renamed the Jules Rimet Trophy in 1946 to honour the FIFA president who had founded the World Cup.

FIFA's 1930 rules awarded the trophy permanently to the first nation to win it three times. Brazil reached that threshold in 1970 with Pele's third World Cup, and the Jules Rimet trophy was handed to the Brazilian Football Confederation in perpetuity. The trophy was kept at the CBF headquarters in Rio de Janeiro until 19 December 1983, when it was stolen from a wooden-fronted display case. Despite multiple police investigations across three decades it has never been recovered, with most theories concluding the gold was melted down within weeks of the theft.

FIFA's 1971 brief for the replacement trophy was specific: a design that "captures the moment of victory" without depending on figurative deities (Nike was felt to be too Eurocentric for a global tournament). 53 sculptors submitted entries. Gazzaniga's submission depicted two unidentified human figures, arms upraised, jointly supporting a stylised globe etched with continental outlines. The figures were deliberately ambiguous in gender and ethnicity, the goal being a universal rather than nationally specific image.

Gazzaniga later described the design as influenced by the Italian Futurist sculpture tradition of Umberto Boccioni, with the dynamic upward curve of the figures echoing Boccioni's 1913 "Unique Forms of Continuity in Space." Production was awarded to Italian goldsmith Bertoni of Milan, with the trophy cast in solid 18-carat gold and the malachite bands sourced from a mine in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Total production cost in 1971 was approximately $50,000 (around £550,000 in 2026 money).

Unlike the Jules Rimet trophy, the Gazzaniga trophy is never awarded permanently. After a World Cup final, the winning team's captain receives the original for the post-match podium ceremony. The trophy then accompanies the team home for a 3-5 day victory celebration in the winning country, traveling under FIFA security. After that period it returns to FIFA headquarters in Zurich, where it is kept in a vault between tournaments.

Each winning nation receives a gold-plated bronze replica known officially as the "FIFA World Cup Winners' Trophy." The replica is dimensionally identical to the original but weighs slightly less (5.9 kg vs 6.175 kg) due to the bronze-and-plating construction. The replica is the version typically displayed at national football association headquarters — the trophy on display at the German DFB Museum in Dortmund, for example, is the Winners' Trophy replica from West Germany's 1974 win, not the original.

The base of the Gazzaniga trophy has space for 17 winning teams' names. As of 2026 (after Argentina's 2022 win), 14 names have been engraved: West Germany 1974, Argentina 1978, Italy 1982, Argentina 1986, West Germany 1990, Brazil 1994, France 1998, Brazil 2002, Italy 2006, Spain 2010, Germany 2014, France 2018, Argentina 2022, and one slot pending for 2026. The 2030 winner will fill the 16th slot, the 2034 winner the 17th, and after that FIFA will need to commission a replacement plinth or modify the trophy.

FIFA confirmed in a 2018 statement that the long-term plan is to commission a new identical-design plinth at the same goldsmith (Bertoni of Milan, still operational and still the only authorised producer of the Gazzaniga design) when the 17 slots are filled. The Gazzaniga sculpture itself would remain unchanged. The detail explains why Bertoni's 1971 archival drawings and material specifications are stored at FIFA headquarters — the design is meant to outlast its original plinth.

Beyond the official Winners' Trophy replicas, FIFA licenses a tiered system of unofficial replicas at varying scales. Full-size 36.8 cm replicas in gold-plated bronze (without the malachite bands, which are export-restricted from the DRC) sell at £2,000-5,000 from licensed producers. Half-scale replicas in zinc alloy run £80-200. Below that, miniature 10-15 cm desk replicas in resin sell from £15-40 at the entry level.

A separate licensing track exists for construction-toy replicas, with brick-built editions that recreate the Gazzaniga silhouette at desk scale marketed in the run-up to the 2026 World Cup.