{"id":715295,"date":"2026-07-28T11:54:40","date_gmt":"2026-07-28T11:54:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/715295\/"},"modified":"2026-07-28T11:54:40","modified_gmt":"2026-07-28T11:54:40","slug":"can-designers-reclaim-the-st-georges-cross","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/715295\/","title":{"rendered":"Can designers reclaim the St George\u2019s Cross?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Having rebranded Team England for the 2026 Commonwealth Games, Form\u2019s Alex Andlaw reflects on the challenge of working with a contested symbol<\/p>\n

Two intersecting red lines on a white background. For a flag so simple in its form, the St George\u2019s Cross carries a heck of a lot of baggage. In theory, it should be one of the world\u2019s most straightforward national symbols. Yet domestically, it has become fiercely contested: at once a marker of pride and belonging, and, for some, an emblem burdened by increasingly fraught political and cultural associations.<\/p>\n

Considering its current status, not to mention its enduring colonial overtones, the St George\u2019s Cross poses a particularly tricky challenge for designers. Chiefly, if the flag is a mandatory part of your design brief, how do you repurpose it without slipping into clich\u00e9, nostalgia or something more insidious? And what responsibility do designers have to acknowledge the various conflicting interpretations such symbols accrue over time?<\/p>\n

Those questions sit at the heart of Form Brands Studio\u2019s work for Team England ahead of the 2026 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow. The London-based creative studio was tasked with creating a new campaign identity, recently launched under the banner Ready to Win, that would inspire athletes, staff and supporters alike while navigating what Englishness means today.<\/p>\n

\"TeamAll images: Form \/ Team England<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t \tSign in <\/p>\n

\t\t\t Creative Insight<\/a> Branding<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Having rebranded Team England for the 2026 Commonwealth Games, Form\u2019s Alex Andlaw reflects on the challenge of working…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":715296,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[6225,6485,6486,1120,96,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-715295","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-arts-and-design","tag-arts","tag-arts-and-design","tag-artsanddesign","tag-design","tag-entertainment","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/715295","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=715295"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/715295\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/715296"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=715295"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=715295"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=715295"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}