Berwick Rangers Football Club was formed in 1884 by a group of railway clerks from Newcastle, England who played a match against a team of millworkers from Dunbar, Scotland.

Until 2019, these ‘Wee Gers’ were the only club in the Scottish Professional Football League that isn’t from Scotland (though, as of July 2019, the squad is made up entirely of Scottish players). Based in Berwick-upon-Tweed, Northumberland, England, just two-and-a-half miles (four kilometres) south of the Scottish border, Berwick Rangers played in the Scottish Football League and subsequent Scottish Professional Football League from 1905 until relegation to the Scottish Lowland Football League in 2019. Their departure from the SPFL came after a devastating 0-7 aggregate loss to Highland League champions Cove Rangers.

Due to the club’s geographic significance, when first designing this badge in 2014, I found it difficult to pin down a single design that captured what their current badge offers – the heraldic symbol of the historic Scottish county of Berwickshire with a bear and a tree, the Scottish lion rampant and the English lion passant. Instead, I shared two simple designs. For the first design I set the bear upright against a football, within a minimalistic yellow shield including the club’s initials above and the year of the club’s founding below. The second design omitted any writing and simply featured a football upon which rested the flags of England and Scotland within shields. Below are these initial designs, which I published on 5 November 2014:

Ultimately, while I appreciated the minimalism of these initial redesigns, I found them lacking, especially as two separate ideas. In 2018, I attempted a second redesign, though I also found this unsatisfying. Now that the Wee Gers are rebuilding in the Lowland League, I’ve decided to give the badge another go. Included are the flags of England and Scotland in a mustard and black colour scheme. I’ve also included the Latin motto of Berwick-upon-Tweed, VICTORIA, GLORIA, MERCES (‘victory, glory, reward’).

The home kit features black and gold vertical stripes, used by the club in nearly every home kit since 1908. The away kit is dominated by the emerald green of the current away kit with gold features.

As ever, I am indebted to Dave at Historical Football Kits for some of the historical information used above.