Welcome to tulip time in Antwerp

ANTWERP, Belgium: The official start of Belgium’s 100-day tulip season launched last Saturday with a mega cutting garden at Antwerp’s Queen Astrid square where passers-by can harvest their own tulips.

Now in its second year, the goal of the ‘National Tulip Day’ is to actively promote and support tulips. Bigger and better than ever, the 2019 Flower Power-themed event includes 100,000 free tulips which were sponsored and supplied by VLAM (the Flanders’ Agricultural Marketing Board) and tulip grower Tuliflor from Wervik.

The tulip garden on the Dam Square was opened at noon by Morocco-born singer and actress Nora Garib who stressed that flowers have the wonderful power of connecting people from different cultures. This year the second Tulip Day attracted 4,500 tulip lovers who defied the cold and rainy weather to soak up some pre-spring atmosphere.

Held in conjunction with the Belgian Tulip Day was the annual tulip event at Amsterdam’s Dam Square.