NOVEMBER 27, 2025 — Rochester is preparing to retire a little‑known heraldic banner and elevate its modern flower-and-gear emblem to centre stage, as the city moves to adopt a new flag in time for the 50th anniversary of its “city mark” in 2026.
According to a press release by the city on November 24, the proposal would replace a century‑old tricolour bearing the coat of arms of city founder Nathaniel Rochester with a simplified design built around the familiar five‑petalled logo already seen on buildings, vehicles and merchandise across the city.
The current flag, first designed in 1910 and formally adopted in 1934, features vertical blue, white and yellow bands with the Rochester family shield centred on the white stripe and the word “ROCHESTER” spelled out beneath.
The shield itself is a traditional European coat of arms, featuring a crane, a dark horizontal bar and three crescent moons.
Although this design has technically been the official flag for decades, it rarely appears in everyday use, overshadowed by the contemporary city mark that functions as Rochester’s de facto emblem.
The proposed new flag would formalize that shift by placing the white five‑petalled “Flower City” symbol on a blue field.
Mayor Malik D. Evans has framed the change as a recognition of what residents already treat as their flag, noting that “few people are even aware that the official flag does not already bear the city mark.”
The legislation to update the design is expected to go before City Council in December, with the anniversary year serving as a symbolic moment to synchronize the city’s legal flag with its lived visual identity.
Rochester’s city mark dates to 1975, when Lee Green, the municipality’s first graphic designer, created it under the Federal Design Improvement Program and secured City Council approval and copyright the following year. Graphically, the emblem fuses two long‑standing nicknames: the “Flour City,” represented through a stylized water wheel, and the “Flower City,” captured in the radial geometry of a lilac blossom’s five petals.
Over five decades, that hybrid symbol has migrated from official stationery and vehicles into public art, commercial products and even tattoos, turning it into a widely recognized shorthand for local pride.
Image: IndysNotHere (CC BY-SA 4.0) & City of Rochester
