As the NBA Finals approach, excitement builds not only for the on-court action but also for the iconic locker room celebrations that follow. This year, renowned artist and designer Victor Solomon has partnered with Michelob ULTRA, the NBA’s global beer sponsor, to create the official NBA Championship bottles. These aren’t just any bottles; they are a true embodiment of victory, meticulously crafted with real gold from official NBA trophies.
Solomon, known for his extensive work in basketball, including reimagining the league’s official trophies, has taken sustainability to the next level by incorporating scrap materials from his prior NBA trophy designs into these limited-edition bottles. Five exclusive “All-Time Starting Five” bottles, each honoring a legendary NBA team, boast a gradient sleeve inspired by a carved backboard and feature a removable, wearable gold half-sphere basketball pendant adorned with 25 diamonds. Fans will also have the opportunity to acquire a premium replica bottle, identical to those gifted to the 2025 NBA Champions, allowing them to own a piece of championship history.
Speaking with The Source, Victor Solomon details what goes into producing the championship bottles.
The Source: Your past work includes reimagining the official trophies for the NBA. How did that experience inform your approach to designing the Michelob Ultra NBA Championship Bottle , especially since it incorporates actual gold from NBA trophies?
Victor Solomon: The whole journey with the trophy design started very organically. I’m from Boston, so sports were in my blood from a young age. Stumbling into this artistic career, celebrating the icons around the sport, was my way of giving back to what the game gave me in terms of community building and all the things that helped me. This very organic journey led to the development of a new set of trophies with the league, which was an incredible honor to be a part of. And especially now, just watching Shai [Gilgeous Alexander] lift the conference MVP that we designed—the new conference trophy and all those pieces, it’s still totally crazy to see that happening.
Concurrently, as I was developing this new trophy program and establishing myself as the guide to design and produce all these trophies, Michelob introduced the idea of this bottle. It’s this celebratory moment where, when you lift one of my trophies, you then go into the locker room and lift one of theirs. That parallel, I thought, was very thoughtful of them, to put more emphasis and intentionality around the bottle design. The symbolism of lifting both of those things is the same: you set out at the beginning of the season on this journey, and when you have this thing in your hand, you’ve arrived at the finality of it.
There are lots of beautiful parallels there, not only for the athletes. It’s something I’ve talked about a lot throughout this project: in the course of your day, you and I go through our day-to-day lives, and at the end of it, you might pop open a drink as your trophy for the day. I think there are many great parallels with how Michelob has been framing its part and participation in these celebratory moments. When they tapped in, I’d been watching as a fan for the last couple of years as they reinforced this new tradition of theirs, trying to continue to advance the intentionality and design aesthetic around this moment. As a fan of how they’ve been building it up, it was cool to work with them to create our version of what that would look like for this year. It made a lot of sense to incorporate some elements from what I’ve been doing with the actual trophies and bridge that gap with the materials.
You mentioned bridging the gap and bringing in actual materials. What is that process like? I’m sure making something like this out of gold isn’t a traditional process, or perhaps it is for you since you’re a master at it. What was it like actually forming and turning these into pieces that will eventually be in the locker rooms?
Great question. Next time you’re in LA, be sure to stop by my studio. You’ll see that it’s an absolute mess. We have various components and pieces of things scattered throughout. Throughout the process, we end up with a significant amount of refuse material that would have otherwise gone to waste. As we began to ideate on how to bridge that gap, I mentioned that these two celebratory milestones made it a lot of sense to recycle the gold material into creating this form. All the techniques and materials we use to create this are the same as those I use to make trophies and other items the NBA uses to celebrate. So, it’s felt very seamless. One of the things I imagine is fun for the fans is being able to take some of the DNA of the championship and put it into a bottle that they can get their hands on.
You mentioned how you were able to infuse the actual trophy into it. What are some of the specific design elements or artistic choices you incorporated into the bottle that create that feeling of having an actual trophy beyond just a bottle?
Victor Solomon: When we were approaching all of this, it was about taking elements from my practice. Over my shoulder here, some of the fine art pieces I’ve created elevate icons around the sport, never mind the trophy. The foundation of the bottle itself is a gradient finish that borrows a pattern from some of the stained-glass backboards I’ve created in the past. And then, as I said, I took the actual trophy material and the recycled gold and recreated it into this pendant that carries 25 stones to represent 25 seasons and so on. Then, we put it on that iconic Michelob ribbon, recontextualizing it into a wraparound form that you can imagine as something you could drape around your neck. Taking the object of the bottle itself and updating it to the echelon of these trophies, which symbolically they’d been doing for the last couple of years, but doing it with these materials and techniques, I think, is my main contribution to the story we’re trying to tell.
With all the intricate pieces, the 25 stones, and the incorporation of the backboard, these bottles have are very unique. What do you hope this collaboration communicates about the intersection of art, an item of that value, sports, championship celebration, and, in general, also just community?
Victor Solomon: By the time these players are popping one of these bottles in the locker room, it means they’ve arrived at their goal, at their destination, which has the same symbolic milestone as the trophy itself. So, having those two elements come together literally in that technique and that material story, I think that’s my proudest contribution to this thing, for me and my practice as an artist, and the story I’m trying to tell with taking these elements that are historically considered equipment.
For instance, one of my stained-glass basketball backboards. Truthfully, a backboard is typically made of metal, glass, fiberglass, or another material, which is not particularly attractive. So, taking something that’s almost utilitarian in that way and then elevating it to this impossible degree… the bottle is just the vessel with which the Michelob is being distributed. The bottle is very utilitarian in a similar way. So, elevating it up to this stature, both spiritually, as we talked about, when you open the bottle, it means you arrive at the championship, but now, literally with these techniques and material, I think, is really what I’m proud of contributing to the story.
You mentioned the story in it. Looking at the broader impact, people will be able to see this both at a national level and at those who are in the locker room. What do you hope this project with Michelob Ultra and the NBA will achieve in terms of elevating championship celebrations or ensuring a place for design and artistry going forward?
Victor Solomon: I think the second part of your question… I appreciate your perspective here, as not a lot of thought usually goes into how to discuss this topic. I think many people may not fully understand the destination of the journey. This is a niche thing to consider, but sport is the cleanest meritocracy we have in our society. You and I have our jobs, and we might do a good job for a day or a year, but I don’t know about you, my boss isn’t coming to give me a big piece of gold and spray me with beer.
For the cleanliness of sport to have a clear destination from beginning to end, and a clear goal for us as fans to keep track of, and for the players to set their sights on, I think is what makes sports such a special medium for the community to build around. Because the goal is very clear, and that was my thesis when I originally went to the league to talk to them about why I thought it was important to elevate trophies, and why I think it’s essential to take that same thesis into this project as well. That journey is incredibly clean, and these athletes, in pursuit of this journey, are probably the most disciplined athletes we’ve in the world; they’ve dedicated their lives to this journey since they were 10 years old. So the objects that represent the finality of that journey, arriving at that mountaintop, deserve to be as thoughtful and as innovative and creative as the players that are in pursuit of them.
That’s always been the framework through which I’ve viewed the importance of these icons. It’s easy, you know, I’m at home last night watching the Thunder finish out the Wolves, and I’m on my computer or something like that, and these guys are lifting hardware that they’ve been chasing not only this season, but their whole life. I think it’s easy for casual fans to overlook the importance of these moments. Whenever we can put a little extra emphasis to help communicate the specialness of the milestone, I think that helps draw the fan’s attention to how special these moments are.
You may have mentioned it already, but I’m going to ask it in a different way. You mentioned the significance of the milestone for someone like SGA, or how he raised the trophy and everything, and how it provides a level of care or achievement to show that they worked so hard to get there. It could be for when you’re seeing it, but what does it feel like for you? Or what is the moment that you feel when you see your work in these places, or what can be provided to you that makes you say, “Yeah, I did that”?
Victor Solomon: I mean, selfishly, I get to have my version of these trophy moments with these as well. Being reminded that I get to contribute to these moments is incredibly special. I thought you were going to ask me another Celtics question. But actually, I’ll selfishly pull it into the Celtics: when my guys got it last year, I got to see the marriage of my fandom of the team and my professional discipline to say, “My guys got to lift the thing that I designed,” and it went full circle in that experience. Part of what makes this moment so special, with what we’re talking about here specifically for Michelob, is that the celebration of popping a bottle and all that stuff has become such an important step in that celebration that it feels really special to contribute to another level of what this milestone is meant to celebrate.
Thinking back to probably some of the earliest celebrations you may have seen in locker rooms—the championship moments where they’re popping bottles, and they weren’t as intricate or didn’t have the special meaning behind them—did you ever think that this would be a place that it could go? Or did you ever think that you could be the person putting your impact on what these moments are like for the most elite athletes we’ll see within a time period?
Victor Solomon: I never could have. Someone asked me recently, “What if everything had gone through the plan?” And the plan is so audacious, I could never have anticipated it. I remember being a fan of the game, watching Kobe have his celebrations, and seeing Mike have those private celebrations in the locker room. The on-court stuff is cool, that’s for the fans. The locker room is a historically significant space where players can release their emotions. The tension of finishing the game on court, getting the trophy, that’s one tier. The intimacy of the locker room feels like a whole other thing. And I think that being part of this project now, and being able to experience it, feels even more intimate and personal, as it allows us to celebrate with the players, given how special a moment this is.
Taking you back to the court, and it looks like we’re going to get OKC and the Pacers. So if you had to put on your prediction hat, who wins it and in how many games?
Victor Solomon: Oh man. You know, I was talking to my team about this yesterday, and we’ve been diagnosing what the Finals could be at every step of the way. And I think OKC and the Pacers, from a stylistic and personnel matchup, are great.
It just sounds fun.
Victor Solomon: It sounds really fun. You go man by man… they’re both slim and smallish teams. They have some talented and versatile bigs on that side too, but I’m assuming if that’s the matchup—and frankly, fingers crossed that it is—I want a super high-scoring, buzzer-beater style shootout.
I want to see a lot because the early parts of this postseason have been relatively quick, like a lot of gentlemen’s sweeps. I’d like to get a nice long series, and I think those two teams match up well. I had a premonition; I’ll be honest with you, I’ll make a pick. I had a premonition as we give division trophies, and the Thunder won their division. As I was assembling those trophies, I had a premonition that OKC was going to win it. And I think the vision I had was OKC in five, and I didn’t have a good feeling about who their opponent was going to be. I hope I’m wrong. I do want all seven, especially if it’s the two of them, because I think it’ll be a really good matchup. But I think OKC is going to win it, and they just had… you know, they’ve been working towards it, you’re a real head, you know about this. Presti getting Executive of the Year this year, Shai finally getting MVP, and all the All-Team selections on their team. They’ve been building towards this for so long, and they’re homegrown in the right way. Shai’s redemption arc after getting thrown into that trade that everyone’s making fun of the Clippers for again… you just, you’ve got to root for these guys. And the Pacers have the same approach, having built their team in-house. I think they’re both such great teams to root for, and guys to root for. So I think it’s going to be a really good one.