If you love flowers, you are going to be in love what is coming to the Sarasota Int'l Chalk Festival this November 8 - 10 in downtown Sarasota - so get your tickets now!
An impressive Flower Carpet mention needs to go out to the one created in the square at Grand Place in Brussels, Belgium that measures 77 meters x 24 meters with over 100 volunteers August 14-18, 2024. Organizers from that festival shared the stage with Denise Kowal, our founder, back in September when she was a guest speaker at the International Ephemeral Arts Congress in Barcelona, Spain.
The culture of Flower Carpets is about to be accepted as an intangible cultural world heritage by UNECO .
Kowal visited the event in Brussels in 2018, and will again this August after she participates as a Judge in Grazie di Curtatone, Italy, Madonnari 50th Anniversary Competition on August 14-15. The Brussels bi-annual event attracts people from all over the world. Even with its popularity, a room was available to be booked for only $125 a night, with windows overlooking the Grand Place where the carpet will be made and flights under $180 from Verona, Italy. Reasonable consider the event is only a month away.
The Flower Carpet will consist of over 1 million fresh begonias, primarily, one of Belgium's major exports since 1860. This is no small undertaking and with so many flower farms changing hands and no longer in production, their access to flowers has diminished over the years making getting the flowers more difficult, resulting in other materials being used. This is quite common for areas who have created Flower Carpets for generations - regions use what they can get and afford, so the natural items used changes.
The history of the Flower Carpets in Belgium started with an architect, Eteinne Stautemas. In the early 1950's he started with small designs using the flowers. He was probably inspired by others such as those in Gerano, Italy who have created these ground flower carpets for hundreds of years.
It was not until 1971 that the first large Flower Carpet was created in Brussels and it took another 15 years before it became reoccurring. The non-profit association Tapis de Fleurs brings together illustrators, graphic designers, and landscape architect professionals who come up with each edition. Several days before the placement of flowers, a full-sized drawing is executed on an enormous organic cotton canvas that is laid down on top of the cobblestones. Then the work begins.
This year's carpet will be 1,680 meters of begonias, dahlias, grass and bark and will be completed in six hours. Over the 4 days of festivities the flowers and materials are watered to prevent wilting. The flowers are packed closely to stop them from blowing away, but in these days it takes on its own life, with the grass used growing 4-5 centimeters!
The final day, the square gets cleaned and all the petals swept away as if nothing even happened! Just like at the Sarasota Int'l Chalk Festival... so make sure you get your tickets and to create lasting memories worthy of storytelling!