National Tulip Day opens in Amsterdam

The Netherlands is famous for its tulips. It sends 3 billion to other countries every year.

The third Saturday of January's a special day. It's National Tulip Day.

Hardwell is a Dutch DJ. He opened the festival this year in Amsterdam. Hardwell loves tulips. And now there's a new tulip – 'Hardwell'!

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."

There's a special garden. Visitors can pick the flowers.

For student Claire Hanssen, the flowers are important. They bring colour inside in winter.

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 don't come from the Netherlands. They first came from the mountains of Central Asia. They arrived in the Netherlands in the 1500s. Everyone started to want tulips. The flowers became big business. The product cost more than gold. Then, in 1637, things went wrong. There was a market crash. The price of tulips fell.

This woman's from the Philippines. She's enjoying the festival and the flowers. They don't grow in her home country.

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." View Less