The medal design for a major European athletics competition has been unveiled after being designed by an artist in residence at the Glasgow School of Art.

The brainchild of Glasgow-based silversmith Andrew Fleming, the pieces represent the city and will be presented to winners at the 2019 European Athletics Indoor Championships.

The 25-year-old, who previously studied at the school, saw his design picked from among a group of recent silversmithing and jewellery graduates to be made into the prizes for athletes at next month's games.

Having been originally approached about submitting a design in autumn, Andrew was finally given the chance to see one of his medals up close, and he was delighted with the results.

He said: "They look incredible. There's on thing when you design something, but it's very different in real life. They look amazing.

"Silversmithing is such a messy process for 99 per cent of the time, but it's in the last per cent that they start to look amazing.

"Hopefully they'll photograph well for all of the athletes on the podium."

According to Andrew, organisers of the championships gave designers a wide scope for their medals, asking only that the prizes reflected Glasgow.

As a former architecture student and having worked with simple shapes, Andrew opted to put together what he calls a rectangular "snapshot of Glasgow".

He added: "The idea came together in a few hours and then I obviously spent a lot longer refining it and making the details exactly how I wanted it.

"I didn't want to do something round, I wanted to change that and do something different. It can almost be seen as a snapshot from the sky, a plan of Glasgow.

"I like to keep fit and go running but I've never really competed in athletics but I enjoy fitness. The nice thing was creating something which represented Glasgow and abstractly it was created through this idea of layering which brought a sense of movement to the design.

"With my work, the lines are straight and simple so there is nowhere to hide. It takes a lot longer than you would imagine. Even with practise, things can take 50 to 100 hours to make."

Kicking off on March 1, the event will see over 5,000 spectators pack into the arena across three days of competition to cheer on some of Scotland's best athletes.

Tickets for many of the events are already sold out, with around 600 athletes from 50 nations take to the track in the east end.

With the hard work over, Andrew and his colleagues can now look forward to enjoying seeing his designs on the podium at the Emirates.

Representatives from Glasgow School of Art have shared their pride in the fact a design by one of their graduates has been chosen.

Professor Irene McAra-McWilliam, director of The Glasgow School of Art, said: “We were honoured to be asked to design the medals for another major sporting occasion following the 2014 Commonwealth Games.

“Andrew has infused his design with qualities for which Glasgow is celebrated, both architecturally and creatively, and we are delighted that athletes from across Europe will be taking a little bit of the city home with them in the medals.”