Competition Call to arms! Young people wanted to make history!

Young people across the borough are being invited to make history, by helping decorate one of the borough’s most famous landmarks.

As part of celebrating the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee, the Council is running a competition for local children to help design a new collection of decorative shields to adorn the ornamental gates at Malvern Park.

The Malvern Park Gates were given to the borough by Councillor William Edward Wright in 1956. The gates incorporate a number of small shields, intended to display the borough coat of arms at the time. However, no accurate record exists of how they were originally decorated, and they are now painted plain gold, while the borough now has a different coat of arms.

It has been decided to contact all schools in the borough to ask pupils to submit designs for the shields. The winning designs will be interpreted and painted on metal shields, which will in turn be permanently placed on the existing 22 blank shield shapes on the gates.

The theme of the competition is “Solihull celebrates the Jubilee”, and it is envisaged that the designs will contain a mixture of traditional local themes, plus a flavour of what Solihull means to young people today.

The competition deadline is 30 January 2012, and winners will be picked by the Mayor of Solihull in February 2012. The shields will be hand painted by Council Neighbourhood Co-ordinator Liz Quiney, who is running the project.

The shields will be placed in pride of place on the gates in time for the Jubilee Celebrations of 2012.

The Council is also looking for people who may have photographs of the gates in the 1950s, especially if they show any details of the small shields at the time.

Email equiney@solihull.gov.uk or call 0121 704 8750

Competition Rules:

• Designs should be in the form of coats of arms depicting symbols and themes which represent Solihull’s history and/or Solihull today and what it means to you.
• Designs should be clear and simple so that they can be reproduced in house onto metal shields, i.e. block colour and clean edges, an example design is shown.
• Designs should be submitted using the downloadable shield template, 
• Designs should be in no more than 3 colours from a palate of red, blue, white, green, yellow/gold, silver and black.
• Designs can be accompanied by a few words to explain their meaning.
• The prizes will be a Mayoral reception and the honour of having the design turned into a metal shield and mounted on the gates of Malvern Park.
• Designs may need to be slightly altered or adapted when being transferred to the metal shields.
• The number of winners will depend on the suitability and quality of the designs – the gates can accommodate around 20 coats of arms.
• Entries are welcome from young people either living or attending school in the borough of Solihull who are 18 years of age or younger.
• Please include your name, age and address (or name of school) with your entry.
• All entries must be received by 5pm on Monday 30th January 2012.
• Winners will be notified during February 2012.

Entries should be sent to: Elizabeth Quiney, Places Directorate SMBC, The Council House, Solihull B91 3QS. E-mail equiney@solihull.gov.uk