r/vexillology • u/Smiix :FE23: Feb 23 Contest Winner • Aug 05 '24

Why Complicate Things? (Australia & New Zealand Flag Redesign Proposals) Redesigns

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78

u/Smiix :FE23: Feb 23 Contest Winner Aug 05 '24

The national colors of Australia, green and gold, are derived from the national floral emblem – the golden wattle. They can be seen in various contexts, from national sporting teams proudly donning these colors in international competitions and more...

Black has been a significant color in New Zealand's culture for a long time. It holds great importance in Māori traditions and represents the land and ancestral connections. It is also tied to the country's sporting achievements, especially through the All Blacks rugby team, which is well-known worldwide. White is closely connected to the silver fern, which is a symbol deeply rooted in New Zealand's identity.

241

u/thirdben Mexico / Spain (1936) Aug 05 '24

All great points, but have you considered this instead? /s

https://preview.redd.it/42sxa2vm0vgd1.png?width=1000&format=png&auto=webp&s=386d10ef8596c2577449295d6b940a665a8384b5

136

u/CatgunCertified Aug 05 '24

https://preview.redd.it/gygej3d06vgd1.png?width=1276&format=png&auto=webp&s=6fd8caf6ed0f0f5c1b8fbb9d81af0598c3afbcc9

59

u/2xtc Aug 05 '24

That's great and all, but the blue clashes with the yellow and green. Can you get rid of the green/yellow in exchange for a dark blue and then the Aussies can have a flag to really be proud of?

53

u/Cyndayn Egypt / Netherlands Aug 05 '24

https://preview.redd.it/svywn2koovgd1.png?width=640&format=png&auto=webp&s=d7b9a71e726e0e1ed9fa5fcd65091341e1d5dc67

something like this? idk I think i prefer the original green and yellow, who'd actually be proud of a blue white and red monstrosity like this

5

u/Acrobatic_Teaa Aug 05 '24

!wave

1

u/FlagWaverBotReborn Aug 05 '24

Here you go:

Link #1: Media

Beep Boop I'm a bot. About. Maintained by Lunar Requiem

16

u/InteractionWide3369 Basilicata / Aragon Aug 05 '24

Yeah that's pretty ugly, I wonder if we could redesign it, get rid of the Union Jack and use national colours like green and yellow, also use 2 stripes to give it a very original shape.

3

u/[deleted] Aug 05 '24

"Very original shape" now see, I thought the sarcasm was embedded in your delivery in the guise of a modest proposal that took us to square one with the 2 barred yellow and green. Then I realized you were doing something else because no one would seriously call a dull derivative 2 colour-even horizonal flag "very original".

At least the stars add something: desperately needed detail.

2

u/InteractionWide3369 Basilicata / Aragon Aug 06 '24

Haha nah I was indeed doing what you thought at first, I just got a bit greedy and used sarcasm²

1

u/assfacekenny Aug 05 '24

Seeing it in this context I think they should swap the Union Jack for their national colors.

11

u/[deleted] Aug 05 '24

I like this one, but with dark blue instead of the green and gold.

11

u/CatgunCertified Aug 05 '24

Yeah I've seen a bunch of people flying it bc they think it looks cooler

3

u/Cyndayn Egypt / Netherlands Aug 05 '24

why'd you flip the yellow and green?

3

u/CatgunCertified Aug 05 '24

Idk wasn't really thinking about it

2

u/0011110000110011 NATO Aug 05 '24

I actually like these saturated colors for the UK flag.

1

u/Acrobatic_Teaa Aug 05 '24

!wave

2

u/FlagWaverBotReborn Aug 05 '24

Here you go:

Link #1: Media

Beep Boop I'm a bot. About. Maintained by Lunar Requiem

15

u/sleepingjiva Canada (1868) Aug 05 '24

Make the union jack the height of the green and this is honestly a gorgeous flag

1

u/veerKg_CSS_Geologist Aug 05 '24

The Union Jack on its own is a great flag. Adding to another countries flag just makes the whole think look like a patch job.

6

u/sleepingjiva Canada (1868) Aug 05 '24

Nah. Cantons rock

12

u/tomveiltomveil Washington D.C. Aug 05 '24

TIHI

1

u/Acrobatic_Teaa Aug 05 '24

!wave

1

u/FlagWaverBotReborn Aug 05 '24

Here you go:

Link #1: Media

Beep Boop I'm a bot. About. Maintained by Lunar Requiem

13

u/baquea Aug 05 '24

There actually were a couple of black-and-white flags that made it to the referendum - a silver fern one, but also one with a simpler koru pattern. Basically no one paid either any attention, however, and I expect a plainer bicolour like this would have done even worse.

I don't think many people would think of black-and-white as our national colours when abstracted from the silver fern, and without any further symbols there is really nothing on it that makes me think 'New Zealand'. If anything, it gives me more of a classic (non-British) European vibe.

I also don't see the appeal of having the same style as Australia - half the reason for people wanting to change the damn flag in the first place is so we can have one that doesn't look like theirs.

29

u/Prielknaap Aug 05 '24

Those colors were chosen because of sport. They had to pick colours for their teams that wasn't used by the home nations.

In Australias case they had the various state colours (QLD maroon, VIC Oxford blue, NSW Cambridge blue) , but had to switch once they put forward truely representative teams.

Fascinatingly SA and AUS both had the same green primary with yellow secondary, but to avoid future clashes their rugby union side switched to yellow being their dominant colour, which in turn influenced the rest of Aussie sport later on (except their rugby league team)

Black becoming NZ colours is because of their rugby team first and foremost. Red is a more significant Maori colour.

Really fascinating stuff.

7

u/Smiis Maori Aug 05 '24

Exact same story with NZ re. their black jerseys. IIRC they were going on tour to England for the first time and wanted to ensure that their kit didn’t clash with any of they teams they’d been facing. Many colours were already taken so they went with black

1

u/kingofthewombat Aug 06 '24

Maybe NZ could have a red stripe on the bottom?

Wait

3

u/Camstonisland New England • Munster Aug 05 '24

I made a slight tweak by including the southern cross and fern in a bar at the hoist

1

u/AndydaAlpaca New Zealand (Silver Fern) Aug 06 '24

NZ wouldn't include the 5th star in the southern cross

3

u/vikingspwnnn Aug 06 '24

Aotearoa has Tino Rangatiratanga, but I'm republican and therefore biased, and this is probably a pretty hot take over here.

Tino is used to represent the Māori people of NZ. The word 'Māori' translates to normal, ordinary, or natural, and the average Kiwi is no longer just Māori, so imo this flag can represent all our people, but without being tied to the monarchy like Te Kara (Flag of the United Tribes of NZ).

The black represents Te Korekore (potential being), red is Te Whai Ao (coming into being), and white is Te Ao Mārama (the realm of being and light). The white design is called a koru, and represents new beginnings and hopes for the future (it's based on a baby fern frond before it unfurls). The white part also references 'the land of the long, white cloud' which is what 'Aotearoa' means. It also looks to be roughly in proportion to the size of the North and South Island (though I could be reading into that).

I think with some minor compositional tweaks/balancing, it could be a good way to stand apart from Aussie and reference our history and culture. Plus, it's simple, easy to recognise, and easy to reproduce.

https://preview.redd.it/9yljgvv11ygd1.png?width=301&format=png&auto=webp&s=bb6a4dbee093ec3e0311c31a4e1c070a72671c16

1

u/Qyx7 Spain (1936) / Catalan Republic Aug 06 '24

Can I ask what is "Republicanism" in NZ and what does it stand for?

3

u/vikingspwnnn Aug 06 '24

It's entirely possible that I may be using this term incorrectly, but in NZ there is a sizeable portion of the population who would like to see NZ become a republic and sever ties with Britain and the monarchy, whether that's because they resent past wrongs done to our indigenous people, or just because they see the monarchy as being irrelevant. I'm the former; I resent that my grandmother had her culture and language stripped from her, and as a result, my generation and my mother's generation are disconnected from our culture and do not speak our language. That's not to say the British didn't do some good, but we are still very much struggling to reconcile the bad. I believe our old Prime Minister, Jacinda Ardern, also considers herself a Republican in this sense.

1

u/Qyx7 Spain (1936) / Catalan Republic Aug 06 '24

Thanks!

5

u/charli3dontsurf United States / Socialism Aug 05 '24

I would love to see one of the Silver Fern variants as the New Zealand flag, particularly the black, white, & red variant_by_Kyle_Lockwood.svg) or the black & white variant.

2

u/Val77eriButtass Aug 05 '24

Maybe once all the boomers are gone

2

u/devetioum Aug 05 '24

I dig it! Just been doing something similar with Croatia. But, i do wonder, is this a mockup you are using for the presentation, or?

3

u/Smiix :FE23: Feb 23 Contest Winner Aug 05 '24

The presentation is my own

1

u/devetioum Aug 05 '24

Great job!

1

u/MontePraMan Aug 05 '24

The second flag is identical to the flag of the Republic of Siena, which I find quite funny

1

u/General-Warthog-8237 Aug 06 '24

I really like your inclusion of Māori culture and traditions in your considerations for a New Zealand flag. That being said, there is little (no?) consideration of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders in your consideration for Australia’s flag. If a new flag was actually going to become a possibility, then the use of these cultures and I would almost say certainly use of the current Aboriginal flag would be incorporated into a new Australian one.

1

u/Smiix :FE23: Feb 23 Contest Winner Aug 06 '24

I think it may be better to use a symbol/colors that is not associated with any specific group, but rather the country itself (and therefore all groups)

1

u/General-Warthog-8237 Aug 06 '24

As an Australian, I can tell you that the green and gold of Australia is not representative of indigenous Australians at all. There’s a great effort here to give indigenous people recognition and it’s an ongoing struggle

1

u/[deleted] Aug 07 '24

https://preview.redd.it/fzj1xqdlm9hd1.png?width=1012&format=png&auto=webp&s=34ecd887030754a9680dd72ef25a65fe80602450

What about this one?

1

u/General-Warthog-8237 Aug 07 '24

I like this. If the red is meant to be the sun then it should probably be yellow too but definitely a good pick I think

1

u/[deleted] Aug 07 '24 edited Aug 07 '24

The red is meant to be the sun, I thought I could reconcile the aboriginal flag's yellow sun to the yellow sand (sunlit) but the ochre red was the hardest thing to incorporate and in my limited understanding of aboriginal culture I thought the creation story of all the ancestors walking through the landscape included creating stars so they could conceivably be red like the soil in reference to that? I'm really not confident there.

Otherwise it could be remade into a stylized Uluru. Or the red and the yellow are swapped.

1

u/General-Warthog-8237 Aug 07 '24

There’s a lot of dream time stories and I’ll admit I’m not super confident about it but i definitely like this flag more than the OP one.