Just in time for Pride month, crews have finished work on a mural in downtown Nanaimo expected to last for up to three decades, while retaining its vibrancy.
Located on the Commercial Street and Bastion Street intersection, the design features the 2SLGBTQIA+ progress pride flag, created by Daniel Quasar in 2018.
"We consulted with the Pride society to refine the design and got approval," said James Knight, City of Nanaimo project manager. "We're really happy that the intersection mural is now in place, in time for the Pride parade on Sunday."
Constructed over the course of three days, the mural uses a thermoplastic, similar to the material melted for long-duration crosswalks. The difference is that crosswalks are built using plastic bricks melted and spread through a machine, while the mural uses 2x2 feet pre-formed tiles in varying colours, so it can be used to build the mural design.
After being placed, the sheets are pressed with a radiant heater, heating it up to about 182 C, ensuring it melts and sticks to the road. Corundum is added for grit, giving durability and slip-proofing.
Knight said that there will be very little maintenance required, just pressure-washing once a year or running a street sweeper over it.
"It adheres to the asphalt quite well so it can't really be taken up and we're told that the product should last 20-30 years without any colour deterioration, so it's quite a durable and beautiful product."
The cost of the rainbow intersection mural, including site preparation, materials, installation and overhead for the general contractor totals $118,000.
Quasar's progressive Pride flag design draws inspiration from later iterations of Gilbert Baker's 1978 pride flag, with six horizontal stripes which represent red for life, orange for healing, yellow for sunlight, green for serenity and nature, indigo for harmony and violet for spirit.
The white, pink and blue on the hoist of the flag were lifted from the transgender pride flag created by Monica Helms in 1999, making a chevron shape, pointing to the right to show forward movement, while along the hoist edge to show progress still needs to be made. The black and brown, first used by the 'more colour, more pride' flag by AJ Hikes in 2017, represents solidarity with 2SLGBTQIA+ people of colour.
The black on Quasar's flag also draws inspiration from victory over AIDS flag, which appeared at the height of the AIDS pandemic, and the red, traditionally meaning "life" serves a second meaning on Quasar's flag for AIDS awareness and the search for a cure.
