Udinese release earthquake commemorative shirt to mark 50 years since the 1976 Friuli disaster

Udinese Calcio have released a commemorative shirt with Macron to mark the 50th anniversary of the 1976 Friuli earthquake. The shirt carries the inscription "Il Friuli ringrazia e non dimentica" — the Friuli is grateful and does not forget — and was released on 29 April 2026, days before the anniversary of the disaster on 6 May.

The design

The shirt uses a stone base, a deliberate reference to the material at the centre of the region's recovery. Sublimated graphics across the fabric reproduce the texture of the Venzone Cathedral façade: the 14th-century church was destroyed in the earthquake and rebuilt, over decades, using the original stones recovered from the rubble. The pattern is subtle enough to read as a tonal design at a distance, but the reference is specific.

The collar is a V-neck with black and white trim. The cuffs are asymmetrical: one follows the standard trim, the other is fully black. A vintage-format Udinese crest sits on the left chest, with the Macron logo on the right. There is no shirt sponsor, a deliberate choice to keep the shirt's commemorative function uncluttered.

The inscription "Il Friuli ringrazia e non dimentica" runs across the front in a handwritten-style black typeface. The neck label reads "Friuli 1976–2026" and the collar includes references to Friulian symbolism and to "L'Orcolat", the local name used for the earthquake in the Friulian dialect. The shirt is produced from recycled polyester Eco Fabric.

The story

On 6 May 1976, an earthquake of magnitude 6.5 struck the Friuli region of northeast Italy. The damage was concentrated in the foothills of the Carnian Alps. Nearly 1,000 people were killed, around 3,000 were injured, and entire towns were left uninhabitable. Venzone, a medieval walled town roughly 25 kilometres north of Udine, was almost completely destroyed.

What followed in Venzone became one of the most documented examples of post-disaster reconstruction in Italian history. Residents and volunteers catalogued every stone from the collapsed buildings, numbering and storing them so that the town could be rebuilt as closely as possible to its original form. The cathedral of Sant'Andrea, dating from the 14th century, was reconstructed over more than two decades using this method: 72,000 stones recovered, classified, and returned to their original positions. The result is a building that looks as it did before the earthquake because it is, in large part, the same building.

That process, and that cathedral, are what the shirt's sublimated texture references. The stone-coloured base is not decorative shorthand. It is a direct visual citation of the material that was collected, documented, and used to put Venzone back together.

Udinese were founded in Udine in 1896 and have played in Friuli throughout their history. The region is their identity as directly as the black and white stripes that the club have worn for most of their existence. A commemorative shirt marking this anniversary is a straightforward decision, and the design is specific enough to justify the format.