Tulip festival starts flower season - 31st January 2024

The Netherlands exports around three billion tulips annually and is the world's most important producer of the colourful flowers.

National Tulip Day, the third Saturday of January, marks the beginning of the season. In Amsterdam, the event was opened by local DJ Robbert van de Corput, who's known as Hardwell. There's a new tulip which is named after him - 'Hardwell' - something which has made him feel proud.

Robbert van de Corput (stage name, Hardwell): "I like tulips, I like flowers in general. I think it's amazing and well, as I mentioned, like, a tulip is such a special flower and I'm really honoured to have, well, one named after me now."

Guests can pick the bright flowers, at no extra cost. One visitor, student Claire Hanssen, welcomes the colour that tulips bring in the grey winter months.

Claire Hanssen, Student: "I think they're very beautiful and considering how cold and grey it's been, I think it's very nice to bring colour into the house."

Tulips and the Netherlands go hand in hand, but the flowers originally came from the mountains of Central Asia. They were first introduced to the Netherlands in the 1500s and by the following century, their popularity had grown. They were a major trading product, with tulip bulbs worth more than gold. At the time, certain bulbs could be worth more than an average man's salary.

Strangely, the tulip market crashed in 1637, yet the attraction of these happy-looking flowers carries on.

Rotchel admires the sea of colours, especially as tulips aren't a familiar sight back home, in the Philippines.

Rotchel Mae Padulaga: "Well, it's like a beautiful flowers and it's not, it's very rare to see because we doesn't have that in the Philippines so, that's really really makes us happy to see the tulips and experience that by ourselves here."