There was nothing wrong with Utah’s old state flag. We’d call it “serviceable,” but lawmakers thought it was time for a glow-up. The Utah State Flag Task Force received 7,000 flag designs and 44,000 public comments before selecting the final design (top). The new Utah flag features a mountain landscape, beehive and star to represent Utah’s eight Tribal Nations. The Utah State Legislature will vote on whether to adopt the final flag design during the 2023 General Session.
Here is what the symbols on the flag represent:
- Blue for knowledge, freedom, and tradition, as well as Utah’s natural lakes and dark skies.
- A band of rugged white suggests Utahns’ idea of home, and evoke the mountains that called to, and cradled, generations of our ancestors.
- A gold hexagon for prosperity and industry, our state’s slogan, and our desert landscapes.
- A beehive for prosperity and our identity as the Beehive State.
- An eight-pointed star for hope, which represents the foundation of our state, and for the state’s Tribal Nations.
- A red rock valley represents Southern Utah’s majestic landscapes.
The name of the statewide initiative, More Than Just A Flag, “signifies its greater purpose,” according to the task force. After an extensive public engagement campaign throughout 2022, the proposed new design aims to represent Utahns’ shared values now.
Here were some of the other favorite designs before the final design was chosen:
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