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Lancashire (England)

image by Jason Saber, 6 July 2009

Lancashire County
White Lancashire Flag
Banner of arms

See also:

Lancashire County

Lancashire seems to have followed the tracks of Yorkshire [in having a flag recorded by the UK Flag Registry], but with less presence in the media. In the "Lancashire Evening Post", 29 July 2008, Chris Visser reported the registration of the new flag of Lancashire with the Flag Institute:
"The traditional red rose of Lancashire has turned yellow for the 21st century. For the first time, Lancastrians can wave this county flag ... without having to get planning permission first. But as the Scottish town of Montrose had already registered a flag with a red rose and white background, Lancashire has had to brighten things up. This new design has now officially been registered with the Flag Institute – meaning proud Lancastrians are free to wave it at will. Chris Dawson, chairman of the Friends of Real Lancashire, which registered the flag, said: "The Lancashire coat of arms is yellow and red, so the yellow seemed to be an appropriate colour. "It seems to have been favourably accepted by everyone who has seen it. I think it will show up better than the white, which often clashes against the clouds. We'd like to see everybody flying the Lancashire flag. We want to see it on public buildings."

The Flag Institute's chief flag expert, or vexillologist, Graham Bartram said: "One of our rules is that you can't have two flags which are the same, so we suggested that they modify the background. "It's quite a striking flag and we did research to make sure it was a Lancashire rose. The middle sepal on the Lancashire rose points upwards but downwards on the Yorkshire rose.""
Source: http://www.lep.co.uk/news/Lancashire-flag-is-all-yellow.4333614.jp
Ivan Sache, 31 July 2008

White Lancashire Flag

image by Kevin Lea, 4 December 2007

The emblem of Lancashire is the red rose, in contrast to the white rose of Yorkshire. However, this emblem does not seem to have been used on a flag. The red rose was originally a symbol of Lancaster, and seems to have been invented by Henry VII. He however used the combined "Tudor Rose", so the red rose alone would never have been used.
Nathan Lamm, 9 September 2002

There is, apparently, an official flag for Lancashire, but am reasonably certain that the one described above is not it. I have no background so cannot confirm that this is the design, but the one of which I am aware consists of three gold triangles (two upright and one reversed) on a red field, with three red roses one in the centre of each triangle. I have the definite feeling that the red rose on white described by James is actually a commercial venture, and despite what he was told the only flag I have ever seen flying from the County Hall in Preston is the Union Jack?
Christopher Southworth, 11 February 2006

I have seen a flag depicting the Lancashire rose flying outside what used to be the office block for Leyland Motors known as Lancaster House. It used to be flown alongside the Leyland Motors company logo flag at the front of the building. However since Leyland Motors closed down some years ago, and the building premises were taken over by Enterprise plc, I have seen no flag(s) flying from that particular mast.
A member from the Leyland forums kindly sent me a picture of what I believe to be the flag that was sometimes flown from outside Lancaster House. I am familiar with the flag, the Red Rose had 5 equally spaced sepals with the 'pointer' sepal orientated face down on the flag, on a white background. I was also interested to notice that the orientation of the rose sepals on the flag was the same as that which is depicted on its counterpart the Yorkshire flag. I cannot confirm whether this flag is official, my guess is that it will be as official as the Yorkshire counterpart.
Kevin Lea, 4 December 2007

Banner of Arms

image by Jason Saber, 6 July 2009

This flag is a banner of arms of Lancashire County Council.
Laurence Jones, 12 February 2006