In August 2016 the Grand-Place in Brussels, the city's historic main square, disappeared under a carpet of flowers designed around Japanese motifs. The occasion was diplomatic: Belgium and Japan were marking 150 years since their first treaty of amity, commerce and navigation, signed on 1 August 1866.
The 2016 carpet, shown from 12 to 15 August, filled roughly 1,800 square metres in front of the Gothic Town Hall. Contemporary reports put it at about 600,000 blooms laid by some 120 volunteers in around four hours, after months of planning by the Belgian non-profit that organises the event. Cranes, koi carp, cherry blossom and stylised Japanese patterns ran across the square, readable as a single picture from the Town Hall balcony and as a dense field of petals at ground level.
Below, each photo is explained: what it shows, how the carpet was made and why the tradition has lasted more than half a century.
A Brussels Tradition Since 1971
According to the official Flower Carpet site, the first carpet on the Grand-Place was made in 1971 by the Ghent landscape architect Etienne Stautemans, who had been creating flower carpets since the early 1950s. It proved so popular that it became a fixture, and since 1986 it has been laid every two years, around the weekend of 15 August, the Assumption Day holiday. Each edition has its own theme, and Wikipedia estimates that 150,000 to 200,000 people come to see it.
Begonias, a major crop around Ghent, were the traditional flower for the first 22 editions. As Belgian begonia growing declined, the organisers switched to dahlias. The square itself is part of the attraction: the Grand-Place has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1998, and its Town Hall, built between 1401 and 1455, is the only medieval building on the square to survive the French bombardment of 1695.
Designing and Building the 2016 Japan Carpet
A flower carpet starts on paper. Designers choose a theme, draw the image to scale and work out how many flowers of each colour every area will need. The blooms are ordered months ahead so that growers can time them to open in mid-August.
On the square, the design is transferred using a full-size plastic template or marked grid, so that each volunteer knows exactly which colour goes where. Begonia heads are then packed tightly together, with grass and bark used for some outlines and paths. It is fast, physical work done on hands and knees on cobblestones, usually in summer heat.
Flowercarpet.be
Seen from the far end of the square, the finished carpet stretches toward the King's House (Maison du Roi), the neo-Gothic building that houses the Brussels City Museum. The crates of flowers in the foreground show how much material was needed even for the decorative borders and edging.
Flowercarpet.be
Here volunteers kneel around the outer edge of a large circular motif built around a stylised red bird, most likely a crane, which stands for long life and good fortune in Japan. The white field around it is made of thousands of pale blooms, and the red sun-like disc echoes the Japanese flag.
Flowercarpet.be
A close view of the work in progress shows two volunteers pressing begonia heads into place along a red outline. The flowers are laid shoulder to shoulder with no visible gaps, which is why, from above, the colours read as solid paint rather than individual petals.
The Finished Carpet From Above
The best view has always been from the balcony of the Town Hall, which is opened to visitors during the event. From there the carpet reads like a giant woven rug, with its borders, central medallions and repeating patterns all visible at once.
Flowercarpet.be
This high view shows the scale of the installation against the gabled guildhouses of the Grand-Place. The guildhouses were mostly rebuilt in stone after 1695, and their gilded facades frame the carpet on every side.
Flowercarpet.be
A wide shot along the long side of the carpet captures the crowds, who are kept behind a low barrier. Visitors usually walk the full perimeter, which allows them to see how the different panels of the design join up.
Flowercarpet.be
In the evening the square hosted light and music shows, with the illuminated Town Hall facade glowing behind the flowers. Seeing the carpet at dusk is popular with photographers, because the soft light makes the colours look richer than in the midday sun.
Japanese Motifs in Close-Up
Flowercarpet.be
Red-and-white koi carp swim across a yellow field patterned with wave-like scales. Koi are a familiar symbol of perseverance and good luck in Japan, and the overlapping semicircles behind them recall seigaiha, a traditional wave pattern seen on textiles and ceramics.
Flowercarpet.be
At ground level a single koi becomes surprisingly abstract: you can see that each red and white area is made of individual flower heads, while the green and yellow lines are built from separate bands of planting. This is the detail most visitors miss when looking only from the balcony.
Flowercarpet.be
One of the outer panels uses deep blue and purple around large coral-red flower shapes, framed by bands of white. Stylised blossoms of this kind are common in Japanese textile and family-crest design, and here they help tie the borders to the theme of the central images.
Why the Flowers Only Last a Few Days
A flower carpet is designed to be temporary. Cut blooms laid on hot stone in August begin to wilt within days, so each edition is usually on show for only three or four days, after which the flowers are cleared away. That brief window is part of the appeal: it rewards people who plan a trip around it, and it turns each carpet into an event rather than a monument.
The idea of painting with living material has cousins around the world, from the Corpus Christi flower carpets of Polish villages to the rice-paddy pictures grown in Japanese fields. If you enjoy large images made from plants, see our feature on rice-paddy art and fields designed as living pictures.
Japan Returns to the Grand-Place
The 2016 partnership was the first time Japan took part in the Brussels flower carpet, and it was not the last. The organisers chose Japan again as the theme of the 24th edition, laid on 13 August 2026 and shown until 16 August, with a 1:25 miniature displayed for two years at the Mini-Europe park in Brussels. The organisers have announced 2028 for the following carpet. Dates and themes change from one edition to the next, so check the official site before planning a visit.
Sources: Flower Carpet Brussels (official site; photos via Flowercarpet.be); Wikipedia: Grand-Place; Wikipedia: Flower carpet; Wikipedia: Belgium–Japan relations; originally reported by Earthables.
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