As part of its annual BeTrue capsule celebrating LGBTQIA+ Pride Month, this year Nike worked with the estate of activist/creative Gilbert Baker to recreate his original flag design, which had eight colors that were reduced to six due to production issues.
Baker designed the flag in 1978 while living in San Francisco and the organizers for the city’s Pride Parade commissioned him to line the entire route of the 1979 event with four colors on one side of the street and four on the other. However, the production company making the flag was short on pink fabric so Baker chose to also eliminate turquoise to keep an even number of colors for display.
Baker’s color selection wasn’t random, each shade had a meaning: pink: sexuality; red: life; orange: healing; yellow: sunlight; green: fature; turquoise: magic; blue: serenity; and violet: spirit.
The 2019 BeTrue collection will release at select global retailers on June 1, 2019 and on June 8 in North America on nike.com, SNKRS and at select Nike stores.
Check out items in the BeTrue collection below.