Bristol Harbourside hotspot Millennium Square is to be renamed - and it could prove controversial.
From today the square, home to bars, restaurants, shops and tourist attractions will be known as Millennial Square.
In a move thought to be driven by a desire to increase international visits and cement the city’s reputation as a great place to live for young people, the English wording on the signs will also be replaced by emojis.
Here's how the new signs could look:
A council spokesman said: “Emojis are a universal language.
"As Bristol grows as a tourist hotspot visitors from around the world will be able to instantly understand the signs no matter what their level of English.
"The millennium was nearly 20 years ago now and the name needed a fresh rebrand. Photo-sharing social media platform Instagram is increasingly important in growing brand awareness for tourism destinations and rebranding the square can only help in achieving this for Bristol.”
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The decision has been welcomed by many youth groups in the city.
Josh Ing, of Flair Loop, said: “It’s a brilliant move - the millennium was ages ago, a time before smartphones, smashed avocado and Love Island were even invented.
"And it doesn’t matter if you’re from St Paul’s or San Paolo, Tokyo or Totterdown, you can easily understand emojis.”
The council spokesman added: "We're actually renaming the square with emojis, so from now on when the area is referred to in written form we ask that it is written as the selfie emoji followed by a square emoji, which we anticipate will be really good for brand awareness.
"We chose the selfie because it is truly emblematic of the Millennial generation. They get a lot of stick in the media but they are our future and we want to make sure they know Bristol welcomes them.
"The word 'selfie' was added to the Oxford English Dictionary in 2013 but was in use long before that, coming to prominence through social media platforms such as MySpace as early as 2003, invented by Millennials themselves. It's a huge achievement to invent a word that becomes globally used.
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"Of course we also want our visitors to be taking lots of selfies in the square itself and tagging us on Instagram. It's all been thoroughly thought through."
Further plans to make the square more Insta-famous include turning the water feature in front of We The Curious into a giant ball pit - for adults only.
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