Downtown

Downtown, or its less appealing alternate name of "the Central Business District" can legitimately boast of being a neighborhood these days.  In 2005, Downtown residents totaled 3,785.  In 2012 it was already up to 7, 214 people.

The issue that come up with designing a flag for Downtown is you are basically designing another flag for the city.  The Tyler-Davidson Fountain is maybe the most iconic symbol of Downtown, but it is also a symbol for the city as a whole.  In fact, I would be happy if more places Downtown flew a Cincinnati flag.  I'm not saying don't fly an American flag, but those are so commonplace.  We need more Cincinnati flags flying in this city!

I tried making flags with the Fountain on it, but my limits in graphic design skills are keeping anything worth posting from coming out.

Another route I tried was with the Porkoplis theme.  Cincinnati was once the leading hog slaughtering location in the United States.  So I went looking for a good picture of a pig to steal from the internet.  As I have done before, the UK Flag Registry is a good place to start and I quickly found this flag.  It is for Kingswinford, Staffordshire, England.  The town name is very literally represented on this flag.  That is the king's swine (actually it's a boar) crossing the ford in the river.  The crown is a Saxon crown symbolizing the towns ancient Saxon origins.


I didn't want a boar, though, so I took off its mane and hairy back and tusks to make it look more like a domestic pig.  I kept the crown, now it stands for the Queen as in Queen City.  I also did a slight color change to the blue background to make it Cincinnati blue (from the Cincinnati flag).

FLAG 1

He looks so mean though.  I tried to make him look a little less mean, but wound up making him look totally insane!

FLAG 2

But then I thought of the flying pig, so I decided to try to add a wing to the FLAG 1 pig.  I have to say I think I did a pretty good job on this one considering my lack of skills.  I took this wing from the swan on this English county Buckinghamshire

FLAG 3

That's a sweet flag Downtown. I changed the coloration on the wing to match the yellow in the crown. Thanks to the people from Buckinghamshire for designing an awesome boar and swan wing for me to steal.  I expect to see this flying from Downtown windows, starting with yours Jason.