Alas, it was not to be, and after the decision was announced a few days ago, there’s been no shortage of commentary about the chosen options, with ‘lost opportunity’ being the prevailing theme among the design community and the opinionated folk of social media. But rather than wallow in self-pity at the injustice of it all, he decided to make the best of a bad situation. And what better way to drown a few design-related sorrows than with a nice vintage.  

“Given the Panel has reassigned copyright for all the unsuccessful designs back to me, maybe there’s still an opportunity for something good to come out of it: a limited edition of my 100 flag designs,” he says.  

• Check out this Stoppress interview with Baker about the flag redesign process here. 

He says he consumed a fair bit of red wine in the creation of the designs, so he thought it was fitting to repay the favour to the wine gods and they will be used as gifts for friends and clients. 

Kudos to Baker for havin’ a laff about the whole thing (and showing an entrepreneurial streak) at a time when there’s plenty of very serious discussion. As he says, “it’s a bit of light relief.” And while he says he’s not going to put any of them on tea towels, let’s hope he takes the opportunity to put them on flagons. 

This article originally appeared on Stoppress