Spirit of 1994

[Mike_Oettle]

After a long wait, I have finally been able to make some decisions concerning the tartan I designed last year based on the South African flag.
I have altered the colours to conform more closely to those actually used in the flag:

I had been waiting to hear from Fred Brownell, the retired State Herald of South Africa, who designed the flag in 1993. When I phoned him a few weeks back, he told me that his wife had suffered a heart attack in September, and that he had been fully occupied in caring for her. As he spoke, he said, she was able to walk around by herself once more, but she was still in need of a lot of rest.
I had proposed to call the tartan Brownell’s Flag, but he felt that his name ought to be left out of it. He proposed the name Flag Tartan instead, and gave me the go-ahead to register it.
When I wrote to the Bureau of Heraldry in Pretoria I was informed that the Heraldry Act, under which the Bureau operates, gives it no authority to register tartans. It could not permit me to design a tartan based on the national flag, but it could also not forbid it.
This means I can register the tartan in Edinburgh, provided my wife gives me the nod to pay the £70 (R763, $114) registration fee. So far, she has balked at the idea.
But I have finally picked a suitable name for it: Spirit of 1994.
It represents the high hopes we had for our country when we went to the polls in that year to elect a democratic government under a new Constitution.
Let me know what you fellows think of it.
Regards,
Mike

[Chirs]

I like it. I'm not tartan expert but I think it's bright and nicely balanced. The white lines seem a little overwhelming for me (remembering that I am no expert). I'm wondering what it would look like without the white outlining the red...

[Mike_Oettle]

Hi, Chris, and thanks for your positive comment.
In the flag, the white and the blue are separated from the green by white fimbriations, while the black is separated from the green by a yellow fimbriations. So these colours are essential to the tartan design, too.
Regards,
Mike

[SlackerDrummer]

Mike,

I like the idea, but I think the color arrangement could be improved to more closely resemble the flag. By switching the blue and green on yours and alternating the wide (now) blue stripe with the wide red stripe, you can have the colors match up exactly how the flag does:



To give it a little more pizazz, you could also add some white pinstripes in the middle of the red and blue sections, like this:



Regards,

[Mike_Oettle]

Hi, Ken – I am unable to make sense of your suggestions, because the images have been replaced on my screen by a picture of a frog on an ice block – many images posted from the US on X Marks have this problem for me (and I am not sure in what other countries the problem exists).
Perhaps you should link your pictures from Photobucket.
Regards,
Mike

[SlackerDrummer]

I uploaded the images to my album here and edited my previous post. See if that helps.

[davidlpope]

To give it a little more pizazz, you could also add some white pinstripes in the middle of the red and blue sections, like this:

Reminds me of the Caledonia tartan:

[Mike_Oettle]

After long consideration and some playing around at Scotweb this evening, I have come up with these two variations. The first is in colours as close as I could get them to the actual flag colours, while the second is in colours more traditionally associated with kilts.
Let me know what you folks think of them.
Spirit of 1994 (flag colours):

Spirit of 1994 (tartan colours):

Regards,
Mike

[NorCalPiper]

Having lived in South Africa and Namibia for 6 years (I have 2 children who live and school there as well), I will certainly be onboard for how ever this develops. I DON'T like the pinstriping, I hope you decide to keep the original-That really fits for me! This may be over the top too much, but what would be cool is if you could do the flag in the back pleating. Kinda' like the saltire flag kilt...maybe thats a bit much..

[Brian K]

Glad to see you moving forward on this project, Mike. As you know, this was not my favorite of the setts we all kicked around with and for you on Scotweb, but it's your project and i hope it works out for you.

At the very least I think you should reduce the width of the white and yellow stripes by half, at least. To my eye they are so bright relative to the other colors in the sett that they give it a somewhat fuzzy appearance.

A suggestion that changes your sett much less than the other proposals I made at Scotweb - in fact it's your sett with the white and yellow reduced, no other changes:



You do realize, of course, that the Tartans Registry will most likely categorize it as a fashion tartan because it can not give it any sort of official designation without the cooperation of the South African Government. Generally they will not give an official designation to any tartan without someone who has the right to authorize that designation registering the tartan, if I recall correctly. For example, in this case it would be necessary for the SA Parliament to pass a resolution authorizing this as an official national emblem and the Speaker or the Clerk of the parliament would likely have to be listed as the registrant. Or, perhaps, the president could do it by decree and an official of his office would have to be the registrant.

There's nothing wrong with it being a fashion tartan, but it sure would be nice to have it "official." Good luck, my friend!

Regards,

Brian