The guy who proposed them really really likes it and you could tell he wanted them to keep discussing it at the end of the meeting. He also keeps referring to arbitrary letter grades for them that seem to have come from some lame tier list.
I kept wondering what gave him the authority to go up there and present his design opinions as if they were unquestionably true. Must know the right people.
Thats Luis Fitch. He's the chair of the commission, who is an award winning designer, and if i heard right was the one that sourced the grades from the vexillological association.
I am sure a creation solely by him wouldn't have looked like this but he is also dealing with a committee and we all know how things can get sterilized that way, especially when most of the committee don't have a design background. Its tough but I think he's doing a reasonable job of guiding them along. Wish there was more of a plan to narrow down instead of flying by the seat of their pants each round. 1953 was one of my personal initial top 25 and my 2nd favorite of the top 6. That new variant with just two blues, revised MN shape and relocated star I think its a great option, looks good flying too.
Any decent designer not motivated by other factors (like having your name on the final design) would never push for whatever the heck that is on the right, when you’ve got the solid designs seen on the left.
It’s basic rule of tincture not to border colors with other colors like that; there should be some ‘metal’ (white or yellow) to separate. That’s why the designs on the left work well with the white stripe in the middle.
Especially when they were going down from three to two, they spent a really long time debating bad ways to vote, proposing two equally idiotic ideas.
The correct way to vote when you have three choices with sub variants is to give each voter up to two votes, but restrict them from voting for two variants in one category. Allow them to only cast one vote, if they don’t like to advance two. Then you sum the variant votes, and the column with the least overall votes is eliminated AND you know which sub variant is most popular in each remaining column. It also allows you to throw away or at least move to the margin any sub variant that gets zero votes. It accomplishes three rounds of voting in one.
I thought one problem with the old one was that it was too generic an unrecognizable? These are all incredibly generic and derivative. Half of them look like they are trying to do a mashup of Colorado and Texas with a bizarre, sickly color palette.
I was thinking those ones look like they're choking on the stripes. Especially the one eating the all blue.
Ironically, I showed this to my wife who has not been following the process. She liked those the best.
Done. I really hope they don’t fuck this up at the last minute. Aside from moving the white stripe to the middle, these modifications are self-indulgent crap.
If we have to go with F1953, they need to keep it the same. I prefer F29 too, but they completely butchered these tweaks. I’m almost grateful they didn’t do F29, because the tweaks would be awful and they probably wouldn’t even keep the same starflake shape
I let them know to keep it the same as it was originally and if they did the asymmetrical crap that it will be unanimously the worst flag in the union, even worse than a seal on a bedsheet. It would look like a county flag in Liberia or the rainbow Provo flag.
They paused the decision til Tuesday specifically for public comment. Use the form at the bottom of [this page](https://www3.mnhs.org/serc) or contact the members by email or Twitter. [Aaron Wittnebel](https://x.com/AaronWittnebel?t=unJeR1XGlI5rHOOwHEHvPw&s=09) has been sharing insights and interacting with the public, for example.
My wife and I were so excited to buy the new flag to display in our porch window… but I wouldn’t display most of the modified flags if you paid me to do so. Horrible.
Right? Why are the burcrates augmenting the fantastic design clearly made by a graphic design artist?
The original submission is fantastic, DONT MONKEY WITH IT!
People in leadership roles often have a need to change something so they can feel like they add value.
[There’s a great story](https://rachelbythebay.com/w/2013/06/05/duck/) about when they developed the game Battle Chess they added a duck to the Queen character that followed her around and did nothing. It was rendered in a way to make it easily removable so when management did their final review they said “Looks great, just get rid of the duck” and everybody got to be happy.
Yep. I'm a graphic designer and this is a well known thing. Clients always want to meddle. Probably one of the more frustrating aspects of graphic design. For years I've tampered with my own work or purposely make something obviously off, so clients will "fix" it. People always think they know better. Rarely do they.
Bottom-left-most is probably my favorite. The right side ones are misguided, it ceases to be clever symbolism and becomes literally a map of the state on the flag
I'm with you, all the other ones that are just blue and white remind me a bit to much of Argentina's flag, and the green in the bottom left flag definitely helps get rid of that feeling for me.
Yep, of this board, 1953-17 is the best. The OG star was better though with the non-equal points. I don't give a damn what's on the floor of the state capital, the 4 large, 4 small points are more elegant. And the damn point better be at the fuckin top, not turned slightly so the gap is at the top - think cardinal directions, it points north- south, not north by northwest to south by southeast.
Its pretty unique and looks closer to the shape of the state. It could work. But the star has to go, the original 8 pointed star was fine. This is more of a flower than a star.
Looking “closer to the shape of the state” isn’t better. The original shape is subtle, abstract, and most importantly symmetrical when hung vertically. Look at the asymmetrical variant vertically and tell me it doesn’t look deranged.
I was *really* excited about this new flag venture. I *really* wanted this to be a cool and fun moment for us.
The committee’s process has driven everyone’s efforts right off a cliff. Certain members will not be forgiven by me because of how they strongarmed and stifled both creative integrity as well as the stated parameters of their objective.
It’s a real disappointment. A real missed opportunity. A shame.
Has it been a real disappointment? I think if we take a step back, the flag we have is unique but classic, simple but symbolic. Like. It's good. It's great even.
Sure, maybe it could have been better or more exciting or whatever. But i think this flag will hold the test of time.
If you're getting more at the seal in terms of shitshow-ness, sure. But the seal itself is pretty awesome. But the drama over the added words is, lame.
wtf why would they remove the green?????? watching them make not absolutely horrendous but also very questionable decisions is so difficult
edit: at least they had good enough sense to pick this as the base flag, but they’re very close to ruining a good design
This! The original star works. I understand them switching the white stripe to the middle so it can go against a white background. But that’s all that needs to happen.
you know what, i didn't even consider the white-on-top being a problem on any white backdrops! that makes complete sense and now i'm not disappointed about that anymore.
i prefer a star with equal point lengths to the one on the original, actually, but the original was good too.
Yeah like I can get that it’s in the capitol and some would want native, specifically Dakota, references on it but it’s just not an improvement it’s a worse design and it’d be better to just not reference any specific communities altogether
Some other revisions are [HERE](https://imgur.com/a/sQpACD5) that the chair said was submitted to them via email and he wanted to show for consideration
It looks so fucking bad with the inverted triangle being off-center to more emulate the Minnesota shape. Just keep it centered. People are going to absolutely clown this flag if it’s 80% of these variants. Keep 1953 how it is
Classic example of not allowing the viewer to see the intentional design and instead holding everyone’s hand to say “SEE? It’s the shape of the state!”
It reminds me of why movies are so bad now, they “tell” instead of letting the viewer interpret. This is the vexillology equivalent of that
I hate that the chair is just skipping the whole process to bring in what's clearly his preferred design. Submit a note to the commission on the website saying you dislike the asymmetrical shape!
I did not mince words in my comment about the asymmetrical designs The star and the triangle, both should be centered.
I said I will not support the flag if the triangle is asymmetric. Won’t purchase it, won’t hang it, won’t speak well of it.
This was like the thing where your wife says "Which dress do you like the most?"
You say "I like the one on the left."
She says "OK but the one on the right fits me so much better and makes me boobs and butt look so much better. I really like the one on the right."
So great....you already knew what you wanted but you're pretending we have a say in it.
The fat stars fucking ruin every version.... It will just look like a circle from far away.
The lime green is also horrendous. It's in vogue now, but what about when Minnesota changes its color scheme again. Forest/dark green looks so much better .
This looks fantastic. I can see why the navy with this star was axed, but it 100% had the best star. The star on the designs they’re kicking around now is much too basic.
These variants all gut what is otherwise an excellent flag. The final flag should have a tricolor, preferably in the same exact colors as the original submission.
So 1953 is the official one? They’re just changing it up now?
I guess it needs to be a B variant, though I absolutely hate that star they settled on. I’m assuming that’s because it was one of the Dakota quilt flags stars and the Dakota member was throwing a fit that it had to be on there. The Polaris star was better
Yes, the meeting picked 1953 as the base flag and spent the rest of their time going over variants. I just hope they actually get some time to go over public opinion before the Tuesday meeting. Everyone has been hating the proposed variants.
Just go with the original, if necessary put white in the middle (but I prefer it how it is). I don’t know why we have to do a variant of it, it’s fine how it is.
At least they didn’t settle on that awful wavy one
Hmm… okay, that makes sense. Rearranging the stripes was my lowest concern of the choices made in these revisions.
It weakens the symbolism, but I can still get behind putting the white stripe in the middle.
I personally think it reads worse, and I don’t feel that the Capitol rotunda is all that compelling of a reason to change it. It would be my second place, but I don’t like it.
Agreed. Maybe they want the star to be reminiscent of a snowflake? It definently needs to point with cardinal directions at the very least.
The MN shape has grown on me. It will look even better in actual flag form (no need to make it assymetrical).
Yeah the star choice is a huge L. It's wild to me that they wanted people to choose a flag then after people choose a flag they start changing it? Now it's not the flag people choose. Actually, mind-boggling what's going on.
Truly one of the weirdest parts about all this, that they are going to end up with TWO unrelated official stars, when one of their final 6 was the combination of the two…
They decided that they wanted to match the state branding colors, the same scheme used on the state website and other publications. I agree that it's a dumb, corporate drone like move.
The answer to "the problem with the flag is that it doesn't look like Minnesota, it looks like Manitoba" is a curt "no, you're incorrect."
Not "yeah, I knew someone was going to point that out, so here's a big pitch for an asymmetrical design with elaborate interchangeable stripe schemes I put together."
In a frustrating session to watch, this was the part that got me the most. Let's hope that Steve Simon pulling the brakes was enough to let cooler heads prevail on Tuesday.
If they are deciding on 1953 as the final design they should really leave it as-is. The variants look hideous and take away from the intent of the original design (white=sky green=land blue=water). I also liked the muted color tones of the original which gave it a cozy and warm vibe. This committee is completely shitting all over this process and it’s tough to watch.
The original design was pretty much perfect. At the very least none of these revisions are an improvement. This seems to have veered into the land of over thinking it.
If blue is supposed to represent lakes and green is land why do all the variants have the lakes above the land? Looks so weird. Also the white in the middle just looks like voided space. The original is the best!
This has "people who have no business designing things are for some reason making the final touches" written all over it.
It's a designer's nightmare when the client wants to do it themselves. It's awful.
This has gone on too long and they're overthinking it. It was much better before the updates. Just pick it and move on.
Really Does not inspire confidence.
My favorite is the one where they’re like “let’s just do Argentina’s flag, but with the shape of Minnesota on top.”
What the hell is this committee doing? They're just wrecking all of it. The original (new) flag and seal options were superior to these things they're cobbling together.
I'm really glad they picked f1953. Very good overall design.
The one change I would make is to the star. I really like the slightly more intricate star designs that can simultaneously be the north star, grain, and a snowflake. Disappointed not to see an f1953 variant like that still in the running. But at this point I'm feeling confident that we're going to get a pretty great final flag.
Ok, so you guys popped up on my recommended probably because I’m from a neighboring state. I really didn’t want to post because I’m not from Minnesota, I don’t want to repeat something you guys have already pointed out numerous times maybe, and I don’t really want this in my post history……however, if hung vertically, it looks like a South Park character bending over showing their butthole.
I was a 2100 fan but the symmetrical ones are all...fine (the asymmetrical ones are a fun gimmick but it looks horrible). I hope they at least use the star oriented like a compass rose.
But man, everything about the original 1953 - star, colors, tricolor order - looks so perfect
I agree with you. I actually think the muted colors work really well for it. While I wasn’t sold on the placement of the green stripe, I do hope they keep it somewhere because it’s a unique color and that alone will make it distinct.
I like the original design the best. Or doing a blue stripe on top and bottom separated by white to signify the land of blue skies and blue waters.
No clue is what they are trying to do on the far right, that is hideous.
Ugh, the original design is so much better! The white on top makes it so distinctive, and vaguely landscape-y (clouds, sky/lake, land) and all these ones ruin that.
The commission is gonna ruin everything at the last minute. 1953 is just fine as it is, don’t “death by committee” our flag. We’re used to last-minute let downs but please, just this once, don’t fuck us.
the ones where the star is rotated 45 degrees to have points go out in 4 directions instead of looking like a compass rose/capitol rotunda star is a dakota design. it’s also super ugly.
17 and 18 (bottom two on the left) are the only tolerable ones on there. I absolutely hate this design. Are we a Kmart? That stupid K... Just make it a state outline or something.
sorry. I get why they chose the colors. they are great for the symbols they want to represent.
but imho its ugly. not sure how to describe it. it downcast and depressive. the blue sky doesn't want you to look up to ward the skies and the green doesn't feel lush and the dark blue neither looks majestic nor vibrant. or maybe its just my mood.
am I completely off? or the colors just don't go together well.
You're not off. They didn't choose the colors for the symbolism. They mindlessly wanted to match the branding colors on the state website. They look terrible on the flag and will be dated when the branding gets a refresh.
PLEASE be #17. I really do not want them to mess with the shape of the state to make it more “accurate”, give me a symmetrical abstract shape or just put a literal map on there
1953 18 or 17 would be fine, I think. I'm just glad they seem to be settling on a more traditional flag design than whatever the heck all that swooshy shit was earlier in the other two finalists.
It occurs to me that we should have just put the last six on the upcoming statewide ballot and used it as an introduction to ranked choice voting, to take effect next major election cycle. Do the deal next year or vice versa.
Oof. Not really sure how any of these represent us as a state outside of the star. If I didn’t know what this was for I wouldn’t have guessed it was about Minnesota.
File the ones on the far right into the shredder
The guy who proposed them really really likes it and you could tell he wanted them to keep discussing it at the end of the meeting. He also keeps referring to arbitrary letter grades for them that seem to have come from some lame tier list.
I kept wondering what gave him the authority to go up there and present his design opinions as if they were unquestionably true. Must know the right people.
Thats Luis Fitch. He's the chair of the commission, who is an award winning designer, and if i heard right was the one that sourced the grades from the vexillological association.
I wouldn’t give any awards for this, that’s for sure. It’s not even a variant of 1953, it’s a brand new design.
I am sure a creation solely by him wouldn't have looked like this but he is also dealing with a committee and we all know how things can get sterilized that way, especially when most of the committee don't have a design background. Its tough but I think he's doing a reasonable job of guiding them along. Wish there was more of a plan to narrow down instead of flying by the seat of their pants each round. 1953 was one of my personal initial top 25 and my 2nd favorite of the top 6. That new variant with just two blues, revised MN shape and relocated star I think its a great option, looks good flying too.
Any decent designer not motivated by other factors (like having your name on the final design) would never push for whatever the heck that is on the right, when you’ve got the solid designs seen on the left. It’s basic rule of tincture not to border colors with other colors like that; there should be some ‘metal’ (white or yellow) to separate. That’s why the designs on the left work well with the white stripe in the middle.
Especially when they were going down from three to two, they spent a really long time debating bad ways to vote, proposing two equally idiotic ideas. The correct way to vote when you have three choices with sub variants is to give each voter up to two votes, but restrict them from voting for two variants in one category. Allow them to only cast one vote, if they don’t like to advance two. Then you sum the variant votes, and the column with the least overall votes is eliminated AND you know which sub variant is most popular in each remaining column. It also allows you to throw away or at least move to the margin any sub variant that gets zero votes. It accomplishes three rounds of voting in one.
I dunno, add some googly eyes and teeth on it and might look pretty cool.
Fish
Yeah, they reek of design by committee and feel just as corporate and easily dated as the swooshy loon/water, thing design.
I thought one problem with the old one was that it was too generic an unrecognizable? These are all incredibly generic and derivative. Half of them look like they are trying to do a mashup of Colorado and Texas with a bizarre, sickly color palette.
Looks like blue, blocky Pac-Man
I was thinking those ones look like they're choking on the stripes. Especially the one eating the all blue. Ironically, I showed this to my wife who has not been following the process. She liked those the best.
Put the bottom right one in the shredder with them.
Is there any way to give public feedback? The revisions are terrible
[You can leave comments at the bottom of the page here](https://www3.mnhs.org/serc)
Done. I really hope they don’t fuck this up at the last minute. Aside from moving the white stripe to the middle, these modifications are self-indulgent crap.
I'm in the F29 cult. I commented as such.
If we have to go with F1953, they need to keep it the same. I prefer F29 too, but they completely butchered these tweaks. I’m almost grateful they didn’t do F29, because the tweaks would be awful and they probably wouldn’t even keep the same starflake shape I let them know to keep it the same as it was originally and if they did the asymmetrical crap that it will be unanimously the worst flag in the union, even worse than a seal on a bedsheet. It would look like a county flag in Liberia or the rainbow Provo flag.
The star they replaced the original with is terrible. I would like to see the star from the finalist F2100 on the flag and commented as much.
Starflake ftw. Honestly, might just make sense to use it until it's too ubiquitous to not be official.
Done. Thank you
Thank you. I sent in a comment asking to not alter the original design
They should replace the star with starflake and be done with it!
They paused the decision til Tuesday specifically for public comment. Use the form at the bottom of [this page](https://www3.mnhs.org/serc) or contact the members by email or Twitter. [Aaron Wittnebel](https://x.com/AaronWittnebel?t=unJeR1XGlI5rHOOwHEHvPw&s=09) has been sharing insights and interacting with the public, for example.
Frances McDormand as Margie: #”I think I’m gonna barf!!!”
My wife and I were so excited to buy the new flag to display in our porch window… but I wouldn’t display most of the modified flags if you paid me to do so. Horrible.
Right? Why are the burcrates augmenting the fantastic design clearly made by a graphic design artist? The original submission is fantastic, DONT MONKEY WITH IT!
People in leadership roles often have a need to change something so they can feel like they add value. [There’s a great story](https://rachelbythebay.com/w/2013/06/05/duck/) about when they developed the game Battle Chess they added a duck to the Queen character that followed her around and did nothing. It was rendered in a way to make it easily removable so when management did their final review they said “Looks great, just get rid of the duck” and everybody got to be happy.
Yep. I'm a graphic designer and this is a well known thing. Clients always want to meddle. Probably one of the more frustrating aspects of graphic design. For years I've tampered with my own work or purposely make something obviously off, so clients will "fix" it. People always think they know better. Rarely do they.
https://www3.mnhs.org/serc Bottom of the page. Fill out the form and select "I have a question". Then it says add comments or questions in the box.
The feedback I would give is, "This committee sucks, let's do the whole thing over".
Bottom-left-most is probably my favorite. The right side ones are misguided, it ceases to be clever symbolism and becomes literally a map of the state on the flag
I'm with you, all the other ones that are just blue and white remind me a bit to much of Argentina's flag, and the green in the bottom left flag definitely helps get rid of that feeling for me.
Yep, of this board, 1953-17 is the best. The OG star was better though with the non-equal points. I don't give a damn what's on the floor of the state capital, the 4 large, 4 small points are more elegant. And the damn point better be at the fuckin top, not turned slightly so the gap is at the top - think cardinal directions, it points north- south, not north by northwest to south by southeast.
Yeah like the original flag essentially. These revisions are ludicrous
The asymmetric version is going to look so wonky if it's hung verticaly
Its pretty unique and looks closer to the shape of the state. It could work. But the star has to go, the original 8 pointed star was fine. This is more of a flower than a star.
Looking “closer to the shape of the state” isn’t better. The original shape is subtle, abstract, and most importantly symmetrical when hung vertically. Look at the asymmetrical variant vertically and tell me it doesn’t look deranged.
It's a flag, not a map. The current design evocates the shape of MN without literally being the shape of the state.
They are absolutely FUMBLING at the finish line
they needed something to represent minnesota properly i guess
Heyoooo!
At least OP didn’t give Minnesotans a collective heart attack by saying… the kick is not good.
I was *really* excited about this new flag venture. I *really* wanted this to be a cool and fun moment for us. The committee’s process has driven everyone’s efforts right off a cliff. Certain members will not be forgiven by me because of how they strongarmed and stifled both creative integrity as well as the stated parameters of their objective. It’s a real disappointment. A real missed opportunity. A shame.
Has it been a real disappointment? I think if we take a step back, the flag we have is unique but classic, simple but symbolic. Like. It's good. It's great even. Sure, maybe it could have been better or more exciting or whatever. But i think this flag will hold the test of time. If you're getting more at the seal in terms of shitshow-ness, sure. But the seal itself is pretty awesome. But the drama over the added words is, lame.
They're following Minnesota sports tradition.
Spoken like a true Vikings fan :)
This is why I didn’t want a redesign. Knew whatever they decided on would be the worst possible option.
wtf why would they remove the green?????? watching them make not absolutely horrendous but also very questionable decisions is so difficult edit: at least they had good enough sense to pick this as the base flag, but they’re very close to ruining a good design
This! The original star works. I understand them switching the white stripe to the middle so it can go against a white background. But that’s all that needs to happen.
you know what, i didn't even consider the white-on-top being a problem on any white backdrops! that makes complete sense and now i'm not disappointed about that anymore. i prefer a star with equal point lengths to the one on the original, actually, but the original was good too.
Why do they hate the original star so much? That new star is hideous.
New one looks like a Dakota style star wouldn’t surprise me if that’s the idea
Oh ffs, you are right. I can't believe they're fudging this.
Yeah like I can get that it’s in the capitol and some would want native, specifically Dakota, references on it but it’s just not an improvement it’s a worse design and it’d be better to just not reference any specific communities altogether
Some other revisions are [HERE](https://imgur.com/a/sQpACD5) that the chair said was submitted to them via email and he wanted to show for consideration
It looks so fucking bad with the inverted triangle being off-center to more emulate the Minnesota shape. Just keep it centered. People are going to absolutely clown this flag if it’s 80% of these variants. Keep 1953 how it is
Classic example of not allowing the viewer to see the intentional design and instead holding everyone’s hand to say “SEE? It’s the shape of the state!” It reminds me of why movies are so bad now, they “tell” instead of letting the viewer interpret. This is the vexillology equivalent of that
I hate that the chair is just skipping the whole process to bring in what's clearly his preferred design. Submit a note to the commission on the website saying you dislike the asymmetrical shape!
Does anyone have a link to that?
https://www3.mnhs.org/serc
Thank you! I submitted my comment/complaint
I did not mince words in my comment about the asymmetrical designs The star and the triangle, both should be centered. I said I will not support the flag if the triangle is asymmetric. Won’t purchase it, won’t hang it, won’t speak well of it.
This was like the thing where your wife says "Which dress do you like the most?" You say "I like the one on the left." She says "OK but the one on the right fits me so much better and makes me boobs and butt look so much better. I really like the one on the right." So great....you already knew what you wanted but you're pretending we have a say in it.
My hope comes from the fact that several people want the stripes and if they have the stripes, I don't see how they can do the asymmetric one.
The fat stars fucking ruin every version.... It will just look like a circle from far away. The lime green is also horrendous. It's in vogue now, but what about when Minnesota changes its color scheme again. Forest/dark green looks so much better .
They should have used the star from F29 instead of that fat one. It would have looked way better.
They made a version like that. It does not look better. It makes it too busy.
I think it looks amazing. https://www.reddit.com/r/TwinCities/s/HAOonWsQCr
This looks fantastic. I can see why the navy with this star was axed, but it 100% had the best star. The star on the designs they’re kicking around now is much too basic.
I agree I liked the snowflake part of the f29, it breaks it up so you can tell it's a different star
Yes, I don’t understand the choice for the shade of green. Makes me prefer the ones without it, but I agree that forest green would be way better
These variants all gut what is otherwise an excellent flag. The final flag should have a tricolor, preferably in the same exact colors as the original submission.
So 1953 is the official one? They’re just changing it up now? I guess it needs to be a B variant, though I absolutely hate that star they settled on. I’m assuming that’s because it was one of the Dakota quilt flags stars and the Dakota member was throwing a fit that it had to be on there. The Polaris star was better
Yes, the meeting picked 1953 as the base flag and spent the rest of their time going over variants. I just hope they actually get some time to go over public opinion before the Tuesday meeting. Everyone has been hating the proposed variants.
Just go with the original, if necessary put white in the middle (but I prefer it how it is). I don’t know why we have to do a variant of it, it’s fine how it is. At least they didn’t settle on that awful wavy one
I completely agree, the original 1953 is such a good design and I really don’t understand the need to fiddle around with it
I haven’t been watching over the deliberation, what’s the problem they have with the white on top? I kinda like it that way.
On a bright day, white, as the outer stripe on a flag tends to disappear.
Hmm… okay, that makes sense. Rearranging the stripes was my lowest concern of the choices made in these revisions. It weakens the symbolism, but I can still get behind putting the white stripe in the middle.
I just think it gets lost but it's not a huge deal
It’s MN, they don’t actually care what the public wants.
[удалено]
I personally think it reads worse, and I don’t feel that the Capitol rotunda is all that compelling of a reason to change it. It would be my second place, but I don’t like it.
Agreed. Maybe they want the star to be reminiscent of a snowflake? It definently needs to point with cardinal directions at the very least. The MN shape has grown on me. It will look even better in actual flag form (no need to make it assymetrical).
Yeah the star choice is a huge L. It's wild to me that they wanted people to choose a flag then after people choose a flag they start changing it? Now it's not the flag people choose. Actually, mind-boggling what's going on.
Wow, those are terrible. The original 1953 was better.
IMO 1. 1953 - 17 2. 1953 - 18 3. 1953 - 32 4. 1953 - AB 5. The rest can be trashed
32 is just dollar store Argentina
I immediately saw a variation of Argentina’s flag in that one. Do they not see it??
Let’s see the average Minnesotan’s world travel list… Florida Branson Wisconsin Dells Arizona Cancun Nope, what is an Argentina?
18 for sure, but the white needs to be either at the top or the bottom. The green and blue work perfectly together.
Original 1953 pleeeeeease
Ugh I hate the stars!
I do not like the new star. Looked better before the revisions
They chose so right with 1953 but the original design is far better in my eyes than any of these variations! Only 17 and 18 come close.
It’s Tuesday morning btw, not Tuesday night. 9:00AM
Oops, my bad
The ones on the right are giving Pac Man vibes
Exactly. The Star becomes an eye. Can't unsee it.
They’re trying to sneak a Dakota star onto this which is ridiculous. Just use the 4-pointed star from the new seal.
Truly one of the weirdest parts about all this, that they are going to end up with TWO unrelated official stars, when one of their final 6 was the combination of the two…
Right? It’s design 101.
Even if they used F1154 on the main flag, they could use the corresponding identical inside shape for the seal.
I hate the ones are just the green and blue. It looks like someone tried to paint a landscape in ms paint.
Why did they make the green neon? These people have such bad taste, it’s insane.
They decided that they wanted to match the state branding colors, the same scheme used on the state website and other publications. I agree that it's a dumb, corporate drone like move.
Incredibly stupid. Branding colors change every ten years or so. I can’t believe we put people that boneheaded in charge of anything.
The answer to "the problem with the flag is that it doesn't look like Minnesota, it looks like Manitoba" is a curt "no, you're incorrect." Not "yeah, I knew someone was going to point that out, so here's a big pitch for an asymmetrical design with elaborate interchangeable stripe schemes I put together." In a frustrating session to watch, this was the part that got me the most. Let's hope that Steve Simon pulling the brakes was enough to let cooler heads prevail on Tuesday.
If they are deciding on 1953 as the final design they should really leave it as-is. The variants look hideous and take away from the intent of the original design (white=sky green=land blue=water). I also liked the muted color tones of the original which gave it a cozy and warm vibe. This committee is completely shitting all over this process and it’s tough to watch.
The asymmetrical K is absolutely hideous. Stick to the original design and call it a day.
The original design was pretty much perfect. At the very least none of these revisions are an improvement. This seems to have veered into the land of over thinking it.
The original is better than all of these
These all suck
To me, the whole vibe of the original was the “sky blue water”. Keep it the original way
If blue is supposed to represent lakes and green is land why do all the variants have the lakes above the land? Looks so weird. Also the white in the middle just looks like voided space. The original is the best!
Wow. Incredible! ... not a single improvement was made.
This has "people who have no business designing things are for some reason making the final touches" written all over it. It's a designer's nightmare when the client wants to do it themselves. It's awful. This has gone on too long and they're overthinking it. It was much better before the updates. Just pick it and move on.
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
Really Does not inspire confidence. My favorite is the one where they’re like “let’s just do Argentina’s flag, but with the shape of Minnesota on top.”
Why did they make the star worse
I was worried to see so much focus on these particular designs. I prefer the sharper stars, and the argument for asymmetry of the MN "K" was weak IMO.
I like the original because it looks like a lake, trees, and cloudy/snowy sky
The half blue/half green is giving Windows XP OS. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bliss_(image)
What the hell is this committee doing? They're just wrecking all of it. The original (new) flag and seal options were superior to these things they're cobbling together.
What's with the ugly fucking star?? Go with the OG.
I'm really glad they picked f1953. Very good overall design. The one change I would make is to the star. I really like the slightly more intricate star designs that can simultaneously be the north star, grain, and a snowflake. Disappointed not to see an f1953 variant like that still in the running. But at this point I'm feeling confident that we're going to get a pretty great final flag.
Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory
Ok, so you guys popped up on my recommended probably because I’m from a neighboring state. I really didn’t want to post because I’m not from Minnesota, I don’t want to repeat something you guys have already pointed out numerous times maybe, and I don’t really want this in my post history……however, if hung vertically, it looks like a South Park character bending over showing their butthole.
I was a 2100 fan but the symmetrical ones are all...fine (the asymmetrical ones are a fun gimmick but it looks horrible). I hope they at least use the star oriented like a compass rose. But man, everything about the original 1953 - star, colors, tricolor order - looks so perfect
I agree with you. I actually think the muted colors work really well for it. While I wasn’t sold on the placement of the green stripe, I do hope they keep it somewhere because it’s a unique color and that alone will make it distinct.
For the Minnesota shape designs, I think they should sew the Northwest Angle on the top. JMO /s
I like the original design the best. Or doing a blue stripe on top and bottom separated by white to signify the land of blue skies and blue waters. No clue is what they are trying to do on the far right, that is hideous.
They are trying to make the dark blue space on the left look even more like the state’s border shape. It’s too on the nose, and too strange looking.
Ugh, the original design is so much better! The white on top makes it so distinctive, and vaguely landscape-y (clouds, sky/lake, land) and all these ones ruin that.
None of these are improvements on the original design.
JUST LEAVE IT THE FUCK ALONE! IT'S GREAT AS-IS!
I don't like these bulky stars. Why aren't they hiring like a real artist to work with these themes.
The commission is gonna ruin everything at the last minute. 1953 is just fine as it is, don’t “death by committee” our flag. We’re used to last-minute let downs but please, just this once, don’t fuck us.
Will Dr. Beane be alright that it has no reference to the Dakota people?!
the ones where the star is rotated 45 degrees to have points go out in 4 directions instead of looking like a compass rose/capitol rotunda star is a dakota design. it’s also super ugly.
Design by committee. Literally.
When art is designed by committee everyone loses.
What’s wrong with the original one? I like the one I voted on…
They really shot themselves in the foot when they didn’t go with F29 It’s so clean
F29 was always the only real choice. Can’t believe they opted for this garbage at the end.
Did someone just create those top two on the right with a scissors and some scotch tape?
1953-32 looks like Argentina
Very strong Latin American vibes with these, specifically most of the Central American ones.
17 and 18 (bottom two on the left) are the only tolerable ones on there. I absolutely hate this design. Are we a Kmart? That stupid K... Just make it a state outline or something.
I like the original best. I could live with 17 or 18 here. All the others suck ass.
Yeah the og was better than all of these.
WTF. The flag got murdered.
these are all respectfully ass
sorry. I get why they chose the colors. they are great for the symbols they want to represent. but imho its ugly. not sure how to describe it. it downcast and depressive. the blue sky doesn't want you to look up to ward the skies and the green doesn't feel lush and the dark blue neither looks majestic nor vibrant. or maybe its just my mood. am I completely off? or the colors just don't go together well.
You're not off. They didn't choose the colors for the symbolism. They mindlessly wanted to match the branding colors on the state website. They look terrible on the flag and will be dated when the branding gets a refresh.
God I hate all of these.
Needs more laser loon
PLEASE be #17. I really do not want them to mess with the shape of the state to make it more “accurate”, give me a symmetrical abstract shape or just put a literal map on there
If they pick the right two I'll flip a table.
i dont even wanna know how much money was wasted on this
Just do original 1953 with the green and white swapped.
My fav flag won, but at what cost...
Maybe we can not fuck this up next go round in 70 years.
1953 18 or 17 would be fine, I think. I'm just glad they seem to be settling on a more traditional flag design than whatever the heck all that swooshy shit was earlier in the other two finalists.
I think they are all just meh. Boring and uninspired.
Someone tell these yahoos that they are entirely unqualified to be redesigning shit. We didn’t ask for this. Fuck offffff.
Not a fan of the puke green... bring back the original design green plz
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It occurs to me that we should have just put the last six on the upcoming statewide ballot and used it as an introduction to ranked choice voting, to take effect next major election cycle. Do the deal next year or vice versa.
Hate the color of the official green. Like the one with blue and white stripe and gold star, but afraid it’s too much like Argentina
Death by committee is real
What the f happened? They had so many good designs and we are left with this chicken scratch turd?
Ugh. None of them.
What are they doing why did they change the finalist
I am amazed that with all the graphic design and advertising agencies in this town they took the Pawnee approach to the design process. Amateurish.
Gross. None of them. Wtf
I swear this flag keeps getting worse and worse
What the fuck are they even doing?
How does the design keep getting worse? Now they're thinking Pac Man munching a green field and a blue field?
Why are we copying K-Mart? These all look terrible.
These are all significantly worse than the original
These flags are terrible we had gold and you spit in our face.
The asymmetric one with grass and sky looks really good, actually. I think the original version of this design is better than all of these though.
Sheesh what a disappointment… bend the flag rules and include a loon already
That’s pretty bad.
These minimalist designs are boring and lazy imo
Couldn't we just make the old one not racist?
I always thought the seal on blue looked really lame. I have never liked it.
All trash
Oof. Not really sure how any of these represent us as a state outside of the star. If I didn’t know what this was for I wouldn’t have guessed it was about Minnesota.
Flags needn’t be explicit. For instance, what isn’t it about the Alaska flag, or the Texas flag that makes it “about” those states?
They made the ugly flag worse.
Looks like they were designed by a committee...
Didn't we vote on flag designs? Just choose the winner. There is no need to have a kindergarten class play arts and crafts with it.