Designing The Maegnolyun
The Magnolian Flag (AKA “The Maegnolyun”) was designed as a flag for the people and culture of the Southern United States (Dixieland). The flag was designed by Georgia-Native Luke McReady over the course of several years. the Magnolia featured on the flag itself was designed by the artist Tyrone “SycrosD4” Barnes who is a personal friend of McReady. The flag was designed as a replacement for the old Confederate flags which McReady felt had become unsalvageable following the Charleston Church Shooting and their widespread adoption by white nationalists. The lowering of the flag from the South Carolina State House forced the designer to recognize that the flags weren’t worth saving, and that there was more to being “Southern” than the Confederates.
Lowering all the Confederate flags he’d flown his whole life made him wish for a flag which could represent The South without any of the controversy and bad history around them, a flag that could represent the whole South with no race, creed, or political position tied to it.
The flag went through several iterations from the original proposal in 2016, but none of them were enough to satisfy. Then, after years of on and off retries, in 2019 the first version was unveiled to the world for feedback on Reddit.
The original 2019 version that was unveiled on Reddit in November of that year and received a good deal of feedback and interest. The magnolia blossom used here was taken from a google image search and just served as a placeholder while the actual emblem was being designed.
The designs canton was taken from the old flags of Georgia, and the current flags of North Carolina and Texas. The thirteen stripes from the American flag to represent the 13 original colonies. The colors were Charleston Green, Creole Pink, and Forrest Green all taken from traditional Southern Architecture.
The biggest complaint on this design was the wording on the canton, and that would be removed in later updates. But the flag served a great purpose in encouraging McReady to continue. Never expecting such a positive reaction from the internet, he’d posted it “just to see” and was amazed that it wasn’t just absolutely hated.
A little while later he would post another iteration.
The second version of the 2019 flag had the the placeholder magnolia simplified and reduced the number of stripes from thirteen to five. The five stripes were to represent the five original “Southern Colonies” of the original thirteen. A small bronze fimbriation between the stripes and the canton. This inclusion proved to be somewhat controversial and it would be removed for the prototype flag that would be made.
However, at time of writing it may be re-included in the final production design. The Maegnolyun intends to hold a vote over whether to include it or not before final production begins.
It would be several months before the next update because the design and making of the Magnolia took longer than originally planned because McReady was in the process of moving to South Korea for work. McReady contacted a freelance artist who he had met several years before and worked with previously to do the Magnolia. The Artist as previously mention was SycrosD4 (Check out his site and artwork here!).
Posted to reddit in 2020, “The Maegnolyun” was completed in April 2020. This design uses the 3′ x 5′ dimensions commonly found in flags in the United States. This was the first version to feature the completed Magnolia emblem. As shown here it still features the fimbriation present in past versions.
The design was initially going to be the one used for the prototype, but limitations imposed by the manufacturer forced the design to be changed slightly.
The manufacturer of the prototype was a Russian-based company which couldn’t produce the flag in its 3×5 dimensions. The flag had to be converted into the standard metric dimensions 90 x 150mm. It took several months to arrive to South Korea through standard air mail and for that duration there was radio silence.
The prototype arrived while McReady was at work and he opened it first when he was there. In person he was incredibly happy with it after several years of wanting a flag to fly he finally had one, and it was one he designed.
After receiving the prototype, McReady began to promote the flag in litmited capacity to friends at first, and then founded the The Maegnol Association to promote the flag’s adoption in the world.
The name “Maegnolyun” came about when ideas for the name were passed around among people interested in the flag. “The Magnolian Flag” was proposed, and Magnolian was even suggested to replace the word “Southern”. Then the spelling “Maegnolyun” was jokingly used to match the pronunciation of Magnolian in McReady’s Southern Accent.
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