The “Cook Tricolor” is an attempt at a unique, simple, and striking design. The flag is a modified tricolor using the colors green, white, and blue to represent Cook County’s three regions: the suburbs, the city, and Lake Michigan. I chose to use green to represent the suburbs for their association with parks and forest preserves. Contrasting the suburbs, the city of Chicago is represented by the color white because of its prominence on the flag of Chicago. The blue represents Lake Michigan. The colors green, white, and blue also represent three phases of Cook County’s history: green representing Native Americans (as used by the Algonquin people), white representing France (as used by French royalty in the eighteenth century), and blue representing the United States (as used on American military uniforms since the foundation of the country). The tricolor is modified to show the shape of the county, including the lakefront. The use of the shape of the county is a simple design that unites everyone within it; Cook County is one of the most diverse counties in the United States and trying to represent the many groups of people in the area would result in a crammed flag similar to Milwaukee or Montreal. In addition, the design is a unique symbol to Cook County, and something that will immediately be recognizable as coming from the County as supposed to be a vague design.