As Friends, we wear our hearts on our sleeves. It’s time to wear our Quaker spirituality on our sleeves, too! To help foster creativity and spread the word about the Religious Society of Friends and our faith, FGC is hosting a t-shirt contest!

The theme is Why Quaker Spirituality is Essential Right Now, and we’re inviting everyone to submit their interpretation of that theme as a design for a t-shirt. FGC will pick five submissions, and then we’ll let YOU choose the winning design through an online vote. The submission with the most votes will be produced and sold through FGC’s QuakerBooks online store.

The submission period opens on Friday, February 5th and will close on Monday, April 5th, 8:00pm Eastern/5:00pm Pacific. We will unveil our top five picks and invite our community of Friends online to vote on them for seven days starting Monday, April 12th. The winner(s) will be announced in the May issue of our Vital Friends eNewsletter, which will be released on Friday, May 7th, 2021.

The winner of the contest will receive a $250 Visa gift card. We’ll also award the top four runners-up a $50 gift certificate to QuakerBooks.

Anyone is welcome to submit a design. A team may submit a design, though the team would share a single prize. Designs should be original and include no copyrighted or trademarked phrases, images, or illustrations unless they are in the public domain (so no Quaker Oats references, please!). Designs can be anything you feel moved to create based on the theme – a phrase, a picture, a logo – let your creativity take the lead! Humor is most welcome, and we also ask that designs are respectful of Friends and non-Friends alike.

Since we are a faith that answers that of God in everyone, we ask that design submissions be free of hurtful stereotypes, language, or ideas. If you’re not sure, think about whether or not this would make someone feel unsafe or unwelcome if they saw it on a t-shirt in a Quaker meeting house or event. You can ask us if you’re still uncertain!

Designers may want to use Canva‘s t-shirt design template to help them visualize and organize their ideas.

If you have any additional questions, contact us via email.

Thank you to everyone who submitted a design! The winning design by artist Tia Green is below. We will produce it in the coming months, details coming soon.