Flags for Birds That Have Flown

Flags for Birds That Have Flown is a project I developed with Melle Mijnhardt. It began with a curious observation: across Overijssel, streets bear the names of birds that may once have lived where houses now stand. What if those birds could return to the streets as flags?

Together, we developed a concept for colourful flags celebrating vulnerable bird species. Each design would show the bird in the foreground, with a graph tracing its population decline in the background. Its beauty and disappearance brought together in one image.

The idea was to give the flags to residents of streets named after each species, inviting neighbours to fly them together and become ambassadors for “their” bird. A symbol of belonging, extended to the wildlife with which we share our surroundings.