the obverse. Metcalfe was chosen out of six designers as the winner of the reverse design of the Irish Free State's currency. The horse, salmon, bull, wolf-hound, hare, hen, pig and woodcock were all on different denominations of coinage that was known as the Barnyard Collection.

Metcalfe's design based on the Trinity College harp was adopted as the basis for the Great Seal of the Irish Free State in 1923 and has remained the model for all official representations