Proportion 3:5 Designed by Gracie Sheppard | Adopted 14 July 2012 | |
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Design Per pall reversed Sable, Gules and Argent a pall reversed Argent over all an inverted chevron of chain counterchanged Argent, Sable, Argent | ||
The Black Country flag is the flag of the Black Country, England. It was registered with the Flag Institute as a regional flag in 2012.
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History
In April 2012 the Black Country Living Museum launched a competition to design a flag for the Black Country. The competition was launched in response to a campaign by the Parliamentary Flags & Heraldry Committee, encouraging local communities to develop their own flags to celebrate the Diamond Jubilee of Elizabeth II and the United Kingdom's hosting of the Olympics during 2012.
The creation of the flag was used as the catalyst for starting an official Black Country Day & Festival in 2014. Black Country Day was first introduced in March 2013 but later moved to July 14th to mark the anniversary of the invention of the Newcomen beam engine.
Design
The flag owes its design to a quote made in 1862 by Elihu Burritt, the American Consul in Birmingham. He described the region as “black by day and red by night” — a result of the local furnaces giving out smoke and grime during the day and glowing by night. The flag background is therefore both black and red, with the chains showing a typical product manufactured in the area. The central white area represents the glass cone, a symbol of the region's glass-making heritage since 1790.
The Pantone colours for the flag are: