Today marks the 195th year of independence for the Central American nations of Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua. An excellent day to learn to distinguish this close-knit family of flags. To make this a bit more challenging, here are the versions of the flags for civilian use ("civil flags"), and in random… Continue reading El Quince de Septiembre
The long wait for news about Fiji's long-delayed plans to change its flag is over. Yesterday Prime Minister JV Bainimarama cancelled any such plans "for the foreseeable future". He released the following short statement: It has been deeply moving for me as Prime Minister to witness the way Fijians have rallied around the national flag as our… Continue reading Fijian PM Cancels Plans To Change Flag
Limited edition watchbands for the Apple Watch have been announced for the Rio Olympics to represent 14 of the countries competing. Many but not all are based on national flags. Which means: Time for a flag quiz! Can you identify the country for each design? For the answers, see coverage by GQ or 9TO5Mac.
Today in 1811 the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela declared independence and adopted Francisco de Miranda's tricolor of yellow, blue, and red. The flag has undergone many changes in its 105 year history, most recently in 2006 when Hugo Chavez added an eighth star for the province of Guayana and changed the horse in the coat of arms… Continue reading Venezuelan Independence Day
You might think that multinational patriotism would involve pledging allegiance to Barclays, but Onjena Yo's project, the Multinational Patriot Flag & Blog Series, seeks to re-imagine conventional notions of patriotism in more inclusive, multi-national ways. This series grows from the desire to see American icons used in a way that represents the United States as the melting… Continue reading Multinational Patriotism
Jabzy (or @JabzyJoe) hosts a YouTube channel focused on Western history. In addition to nearly 70 Three Minute Histories of various wars, he has a shorter (in number) and longer (in runtime) series of Flag Histories -- four to be precise, of Germany, France, Britain, and Italy. Using many images from art history, he takes each back… Continue reading Jabzy’s Flag Histories
RealLifeLore is a new YouTube channel presenting a mixture of geopolitics, history, and vexillology. This includes an entertaining and informative series with titles of the form "What Does the ___ Flag Mean?" So far, there are installments for the UK, France, and Spain. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IBhVJf8n_NM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdFt7TOWq0w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AsxBalxAqzg We hope more installments will be forthcoming. In the mean… Continue reading What Does the ___ Flag Mean?
Jeppe and Birger Morgenstjerne of the Danish design agency Ferdio recently released an extensive set of beautiful vexillological infographics entitled Flag Stories. These have attracted, deservedly, considerable attention around the web, including that of Linda Poon of The Atlantic's Citylab. In her article What's in a Flag's Design? she asked our very own Ted Kaye… Continue reading Ted Kaye on Flag Stories
In a surprise announcement today, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced revisions to the Canadian flag "to bring it more in line with international standards": It has come to my attention that due to our garish and outdated 1960s-era maple leaf flag, many Canadians and would-be Canadians are not sufficiently appreciative of our glorious colonial past and continuing subjecthood to… Continue reading Canada Rejoins the Club
Kazutaka Nishiura has kindly uploaded to YouTube a number of videos of talks and ceremonies from last year's 26th International Congress of Vexillology in Sydney, Australia. You can access the playlist here, or view them below. Opening ceremony Edward B. (Ted) Kaye, Fiji's New Flag: A Work in Progress Nozomi Kariyasu, The History of Japanese Service… Continue reading Videos from ICV26
Portland Flag Association 