Iowa City and Country Plate
2018–presentIowa · current
A skyline at one end, a barn at the other, and a wind turbine between them, which is Iowa being accurate rather than nostalgic: the state generates more of its electricity from wind than any other, and the turbine has as much claim to the skyline as the grain elevator. Where other states print a slogan along the foot, Iowa prints the name of your county. The plate shown is a reconstruction carrying an invented serial, so no real registration is depicted.
Still on the road
This is a current issue, first seen in 2018 and still being handed out. Nothing about it is settled history: the serial sequence is still advancing, and the design will only stop where the state decides to replace it.
Printed, not stamped
This plate is smooth. The design is printed onto flat reflective sheeting rather than pressed into the metal. It is what makes photographic backgrounds and fine detail possible at all, and it is the reason a modern plate feels like a sign where an older one feels like a stamping.
Sources
Reference photograph of an issued plate from a collector listing (All rights reserved, cited not reproduced). Issue date and serial format, which reversed from digits-first to letters-first in 2012 (CC BY-SA).
- Issued
- Standard issue
- The plate you received by default when you registered a vehicle.
- Serial format
- AAA 999
- Material
- Flat aluminium, silkscreened on reflective sheeting
- Source license
- All rights reserved, cited not reproduced
- Reference
- View original