White Rose Shopping Centre in Leeds is calling for a white rose emoji to mark Yorkshire Day.
The proposal for a specific emoji has been submitted to The Unicode Consortium.
A nationwide (not just Yorkshire) YouGov survey conducted by the centre revealed that 58% of respondents would use the emoji if it were available. With 16% of the same saying they’d use it to celebrate the county.
Once every year, The Unicode Consortium – a non-profit organisation that controls the global standard for character encoding used in operating systems across more than 20 billion devices – accepts proposals for new emoji to join the existing 3,953 characters.
Proposals must include a detailed case for use, showing that there is a legitimate worldwide need for the addition and that the suggestion isn’t already represented, overly specific, or flash-in-the-pan.
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“While the red rose emoji has existed since 2010, it’s a disservice to our wonderful region that we aren’t able to share a quick, recognisable representation of the home we’re so proud of,” said Steven Foster, Centre Director at White Rose Shopping Centre.
“That said, our research has shown that the white rose has been used to represent a number of different concepts all around the world for thousands of years. From its association to weddings in the West and memorial ceremonies in the East as well as links to mythology, religion, history, and art, the white rose is an enduring symbol used to communicate so many ideas not currently covered by existing emoji.
“We’re hopeful our proposal will land positively with Unicode’s panel and look forward to celebrating Yorkshire Day by sharing the white rose emoji in years to come.”
Should it be successful, it won’t be available for some time. The Unicode Consortium won’t respond until December 2026 and even then it could take up to 2 years to appear.
