18 December 2025
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The Royal Mint unveils the second release in its definitive portrait series, celebrating Arnold Machin’s iconic 1968 design in the centenary year of Queen Elizabeth II’s birth.
The second release in a collection from the Royal Mint exploring the five definitive coinage portraits of Queen Elizabeth II has been issued.
The second effigy is a £5 brilliant uncirculated coin highlighting the 1968 Arnold Machin portrait of Queen Elizabeth II, which is dated 2026, the centenary year of Elizabeth II’s birth.
As Britain’s longest-reigning monarch, Queen Elizabeth II was immortalised on British coins many times over, with five definitive coinage portraits that created the ‘official record’ of her reign and special portraits created for important milestones, such as birthdays, anniversaries and jubilees.
Her Majesty’s first coinage portrait appeared in 1953 – the year of her coronation – and in 2015, her fifth and final definitive coinage portrait made an appearance – the same year she became Britain’s longest-reigning monarch. Together, these artistic elements combined to chart a particular era in British history.
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Created for the coins struck for decimalisation, Elizabeth II’s second definitive coinage portrait was designed by Arnold Machin. The portrait depicts Queen Elizabeth II wearing a tiara of festoons, scrolls and collect-spikes given to her as a present by Queen Mary.
With decimalisation approaching, many thought a new coinage portrait of the monarch would help aid the public in deciding the new coins from the old. Behind the scenes, teams competed for the honour of creating the new portrait, including one from the Royal Academy that included the sculptor Arnold Machin, who ultimately won the competition to produce the portrait.
The Queen sat for Machin four times, who made sketches and then modelled in clay, with the Duke of Edinburgh being closely involved in the process. With the design, Machin said that he wished to: “produce a design with charm and dignity and yet without sentimentality. To create an illusion of strong relief, thereby counteracting the stringent limits of the actual projection essential in coin production.”
Machin’s portrait appears on the reverse of the coin, which has been remastered by the Royal Mint’s chief engraver, Gordon Summers. Radical lines engraved on the reverse catch the light when the coin is turned.
The obverse of the coin features the official coinage portrait of HM King Charles III. As well as the £5 brilliant uncirculated version, the coin is available in silver proof (mintage of 3,900), silver proof piedfort (mintage of 1,500) and golf proof (mintage of 150) versions.
Buy the Royal Mint's new Queen Elizabeth II second effigy release here!