Photo Of The Day: Turkish Tulips

by Meg Nesterov on

April showers bring May flowers, as the saying goes. We’re getting plenty of rain this month in Turkey, but we’ve had flowers. April is the big month for tulips in Istanbul, and you can see them planted all over town as 11.5 million were planted for this year’s season. I took today’s photo at Emirgan Park, one of the prime viewing spots of the Istanbul Tulip Festival. There are over 100 varieties planted in Emirgan Park alone, many in interesting patterns like the nazar evil eye, a major symbol of Turkish superstition.

You probably associate tulips with Holland, but it was Ottoman Turks who first cultivated them and introduced them to the Dutch in the 17th century. Today, Turkey is trying to reclaim the flower, growing millions of tulips with a goal of becoming an exporter again by 2014. Along with fresh flowers, you can see the influence of the tulip in the shape of the Turkish tea glasses, and as legend has it, the shape of the sultan’s turbans.

Have a springtime photo to share with us? Add it to the Gadling Flickr pool for our next Photo of the Day.

KLM celebrates its 90th birthday with its own tulip

by Scott Carmichael on

If you have ever flown into Amsterdam airport between April and May, you have probably seen the massive tulip fields surrounding the airport.

I’ve always found it one of the most beautiful airport approaches in the world, filled with vibrant colors.

So, it makes sense that KLM decided to celebrate their 90th birthday with something special – their own tulip.

The KLM “tulipa” is a cross between a China Pink and a tetraploid tulip, developed for the airline by the leading Dutch agricultural university.

The tulip can even be ordered online for your own garden, but the retailer currently only ships within Europe. Later this month, you’ll be able to order your own Tulipa bulbs from Colorblends.com.

Another way to see Tulipa is at the temporary Keukenhof tulip gardens set up inside Schiphol airport and of course, at the “real” Keukenhof just 20 miles from the airport.