All the projects where exhibited in the Papal Palace on the Quirinal Hill. Against all the odds Nicola Salvi won the contest.

His project was the least expensive as the Pope Clemens wrote in one of his documents: "other models made by other professors were excluded and were more expensive (Papal Chirographum, October 2nd 1732).

The Pope also approved the financing of the work costing 17.647 scudo (Papal States currency). These funds were provided by the third extraction of the Lotto game in May 1732.

In 1735 the fountain was not yet completed, but the aged, hernia ached Pope wanted to inaugurate the fountain that year as the inscription shows at top of the monument. in 1736 the Papal Crest supported by two winged Fames and four female allegoricl statues were placed on the attic.

Clemens XII died in 1740. The new Pope Benedict XIV continued the work of hos predecessor and in August 1743 the first water finally spilled from the fountain.

Nicola Salvi died in 1751 and Giuseppe Pannini was appointed director of the projetc. He was the son of famous painter Giampaolo Pannini. In 1758 Clemens XIII was elected Pope. He substituted the the stucco reliefs of Agrippa and the Virgin with two new ones in marble.

During the period 1759-62 Pietro Bracci, following Salvi's design, carved the marble composition of Ocean's Tryumph. On Sunday May 22 1762, Clemens XIII offically completed and inaugurated the new Trevi Fountain. The population of Rome at that time was around 160.000 people.