Graphic designer Oskar Pernefeldt has devised a flag for the day when we may make our way to an alien planet. It’s an ingenious and creative thought experiment, and one that can help us dream big. The Verge has a good description of the project:
In a project titled “The International Flag of Planet Earth,” Pernefeldt mocks up a planetary flag and how it would appear in different uses, including sewn onto a space suit, planted on another planet, and held up in what one can only assume is a high-stakes interplanetary sporting event. The flag he designed is largely blue with a series of white, intersecting circles through the center. Pernefeldt went with a primarily blue flag to represent the overwhelming mass of water that covers Earth. The specific shade of blue was chosen with its display in space in mind — it’s supposed to stand out well against both the white of a space suit and the black of space.
The seven intersecting rings, perhaps meant to symbolize the continents, are supposed to look like a flower, representing life on Earth. “The rings are linked to each other, which represents how everything on our planet, directly or indirectly, are linked,” the project’s website says. The flower also feel a bit like an extension of the Olympic rings, redesigned for a more global era. Although, you could probably argue that this part is a bit more of a stretch — the rings kind of echo Community‘s Greendale flag (it stands out a bit more when you watch them all come together in the project’s design video). This is by no means the first flag made for the Earth, but the mockups do a good job of depicting a simple future when such a flag might actually be used.
