It’s every cowboy’s dream, encased in glass in front of the South Point Hotel gift shop in Las Vegas.

Judy Wagner eyes a gleaming gold belt buckle the size of a large man’s fist.

Etched into its face: An image of two horse riders roping a steer amid bejeweled, ornamental swirls, a gritty scene preserved in glamour.

“Pro Rodeo Cowboys Assn 2024 World Champion Header” it reads.

The buckle looks laser-cut, such is the attention to detail inherent in each crevice, each minute flourish — look closely enough, and you can see the steer’s ribs. (A magnifying glass helps).

And yet every step in its creation — the pantagraphing, fabricating, soldering, polishing and engraving — is all done by hand over the course of four to six weeks, meaning each buckle is like a set of artisanal fingerprints: no two are alike.

Every year, hundreds of rodeo competitors spend thousands of hours in pursuit of this very thing, a wearable trophy awarded to National Finals Rodeo champions, created by renowned Western jewelry and buckle company Montana Silversmiths.

“With the National Finals Rodeo and the influx of people into Las Vegas at this time, it’s all about the buckle for these cowboys,” Wagner explains, “because they will go throughout the year in hopes of gaining the opportunity of competing here.

“And then that culmination is the gold buckle that states that they are the world champion,” she continues. “It truly is a pinnacle in our sport.”

Wagner would know: As the former chief marketing officer for Montana Silversmiths, she presented the buckles to NFR winners for over two decades before retiring last year, and was instrumental in securing the company’s partnership with NFR, which dates back to 2000.

With NFR back in town, so is Wagner, albeit under a different guise: she’s the subject of a new short documentary “Nice Job, Cowgirl: The Judy Wagner Story,” which premiered at the South Point in Las Vegas on Dec. 14 and will debut on the Cowboy Channel in the near future.

The film chronicles Wagner’s lengthy, pioneering career in all-things Western culture, from ranch cowgirl to rodeo competitor to 4-H extension agent to entrepreneur.

In a field traditionally dominated by men, Wagner’s a true trailblazer, having founded her own rope business and helped elevate Montana Silversmiths from a once-small company to a big name in the Western industry that’s become synonymous with NFR.

“When I think of a cowgirl, and if I were to look it up in the dictionary, I feel like there should be a picture of Judy Wagner, because she is all of those things,” says Kiki Shumway, president of the Miss Rodeo America Pageant, in the documentary. “She’s everything about our Western culture and promoting and being a positive mentor to young women.”

Among these many young women: Maegan Taylor, the director of team marketing for the Arizona Ridge Riders at Professional Bull Riders.

“She taught me how to be a cowgirl, ” Taylor says in the film. “Anything that I do, I can be strong, I can be tough, I can work hard. That’s just what cowgirls do.”

Origins of an ethos: She pushes herself away from the table, arms outstretched, and grips an imaginary horse.

Judy Wagner’s in the South Point sportsbook, recalling the origins of a phrase she’s become synonymous with: “Nice job, cowgirl;’ ‘Nice job, cowboy.’”

Years ago, Wagner was volunteering as a sidewalker for a developmentally disabled class in her native Montana.

One day, she was working with a woman who embraced her horse prior to dismounting.

“She put her arms around this horse’s neck,” Wagner recalls, re-enacting the woman’s movements, “and laid her ear into it. Her voice was so angelic, she just said, ‘Nice job, cowboy. Nice job.’ And it went into my heart right then.

For filmmaker Natalie McFarland, who directed “Nice Job, Cowgirl,” the phrase is an encapsulation of who Wagner is — and a natural title for her documentary, which she began filming at last year’s NFR, interviewing over 30 subjects and compiling hundreds of hours of footage.

“If you get that, ‘nice job cowboy, nice job cowgirl,’ you’re doing something right,” she says, sitting across from Wagner. “So we wanted to take everything that Judy had poured into others, which is recognizing them when they do well, and pour it back into her. Because even though it’s her statement, she is ‘nice job cowgirl,’ you know?”