Milano Cortina 2026: Public weighs in on future mascot selection during Sanremo Music Festival
For the third time in as many years, the public will give their opinion on another important decision for the next Olympic Winter Games in Italy. This time it’s about a couple of very popular figures…
The organisers of the Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games Milano Cortina 2026 will launch an online poll to help design the next Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games mascots during the Sanremo Music Festival on Wednesday (8 February).
The festival serves as Italy’s most famous song contest and runs from Tuesday 7 February to Saturday 11 February. It is also one of the most popular televised events in the country.
There have been two previous public votes regarding the upcoming Winter Olympics at Sanremo: in 2021, fans were asked to decide on the official emblem, and last year they selected the Milano Cortina 2026 song.
This time the public will give their opinion on the schools' proposals for the mascots of the next Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games.
The two final drawings were selected after a nation-wide school competition launched in 2022 by Milano Cortina 2026 in collaboration with the Italian Ministry of Education.
Kids from all over Italy were invited to participate in the creative process behind the mascots by sending sketches and drawings, with approximately 1,600 project ideas being submitted.
From Wednesday night on fans will be able to vote for their favourite of the two drawings on the Milano Cortina website: they will be used as an inspiration for the official mascots of Milano Cortina 2026, which will be revealed by the end of 2023.
You can have a look at Olympic mascots through the years here.
A look back at the most memorable mascots in Olympic history