Tower of London shows stripes to start climate conversations
28 June 2024
The Tower of London joined various global landmarks, from Brisbane to New York City, in showing the climate stripes last week.
The nearly 1000-year-old White Tower was transformed into a monumental canvas of red and blue late on Friday June 21 to show the progressive heating of the capital.
The historic building was lit up to mark Show Your Stripes Day 2024, a day when the University of Reading’s climate stripes are shared worldwide to start conversations about the Earth’s rapid warming.
Jen Stone, Sustainability Manager at Historic Royal Palaces, the charity that cares for the Tower of London, said: “The Tower of London is a place where history has been made for nearly 1000 years and it’s a place where history continues to unfold to this day.
“As a charity, we are committed to acting for the future – of our historically significant buildings, our people and, ultimately, of the planet. This means making changes onsite – like our ambitious decarbonisation plans – and also harnessing the power of our iconic silhouette to start conversations about the climate crisis and the role we can all play.
“University of Reading’s climate stripes graphic is a profound and yet simple way to show the world how the planet is warming. We hope the illuminations caught people’s attention and helped to start important conversations about the climate crisis.”
New stripes
NASA launched its new Climate Legacies initiative, which invites users to create their own climate stripes timeline so people can see how different generations experience our changing climate.
The showyourstripes.info website received 65,000 visitors last week, with more than 16,000 climate stripes graphics being downloaded by site users.
On social media, people from all over the world used the #ShowYourStripes hashtag to post climate stripes graphics relevant to their city or country.
The climate stripes also appeared on a discussion about climate action on Sky News and were broadcast on several weather reports by US-based TV meteorologists.
‘Ozi - Voice of the Forest’, a new animated movie set to release in August, used the stripes in the background of its promotional poster.
Illuminations and events
Other UK landmarks that joined in with Show Your Stripes Day by displaying the stripes graphics included Lord’s Cricket Ground, BT Tower, Hay Castle and an Ecotricity wind turbine in Stroud.
Across the globe, the University of Reading’s climate stripes appeared on landmarks including:
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On buildings across the USA, including Cira Centre in Philadelphia Dublin Link Bridge, Columbus; The Six Light Bridges, Houston; Baltimore City Hall; the PECO building, Philadelphia.Find the full list courtesy of Climate Central
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On Brisbane, Australia’s’ iconic bridges - all of which were illuminated using Queensland’s climate stripes.
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In Times Square, New York City
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In the town of Bolu, Turkey
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On a tram in Berlin and outside Red Bull Arena Leipzig, Germany, before the EURO 2024 match between France and the Netherlands on Friday, 21 June
Climate activities that took place on Show Your Stripes Day included an ‘In Conversation’ event with Professor Ed Hawkins at Reading Climate Festival. The Running Out of Time climate relay, run to raise awareness about climate change, passed through Reading on Saturday, 22 June. In the Netherlands, 2,500 people cycled wearing climate stripes jerseys.
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