Well, it’s this time of the year again! It’s the celebrations of Kazanlak and the Rose Festival. This is the time when the city gets really different and even magical. This is the time when the whole city smells of roses and everyone is delighted. This is the time when the kids, the students and all the other people celebrate the beauty of our region.
If there’s only one thing that can be used to describe Kazanlak - this is the rose! And not the ordinary roses that just smell beautifully. This is the rose that has unique qualities and is oil bearing one, a rose that gives the rose oil to the most expensive brands and industries about fragrances and cosmetics. These roses have been planted in a lot of locations of the world, but it’s really due to geographical properties of our region that the most high quality rose oil comes from the heart of Bulgaria. For decades and even centuries, the center of Bulgaria has been known as the “Valley of roses” and our products have visited various fairs all over Europe and later - over the whole world.
The roses typically start flowering by the mid-May and that’s the time when the whole city starts preparing for the events that take place in the first week of June. This time of the year corresponds with the year that the younger students start their summer break and you can see the smiles of the kids all around the city. Of course there are a lot of foreign tourists too, although not so many during the last few years due to health restrictions. It’s great that this year people start traveling again, although the Japanese tourists which formed one of the biggest groups are still afraid to travel. At least there are a lot of Europeans around this year.
At the peak of our festival there is a special event that shows all the best from our lifestyle. This is the Festival procession where all the kids participating in various clubs, elderly people that take part in rose picking and all the art studios and theater studios walk along the Main Street of the city. You can see the Queen of Roses in front of this procession. This is a girl that’s picked in a beauty competition and she is the every years face of the festival. There is a special event about the most beautiful young girl where the participants are 7 years old or less.
This is the Queen of roses back in 2008
And this is the mini Miss Rose from the same year
I remember when I was young I was waiting the day of the procession with a lot of impatience and beautiful feelings. Being a participant in a folk dance ensemble for about 22 years, it was our showing to the whole city and the beauty of Bulgarian traditional dresses and clothes is magnificent.
Of course, only by seeing these photos you can barely feel all the spirit with all its strength, but try imagining all these happy people and all the beautiful rose aromas floating in the air. It’s just everyone celebrating the most beautiful time of the year.
Our city has strong connection with a lot of cities around the world, including France, England, Japan and even South Korea. I was in Seoul when a delegation of Kazanlak visited the capital of this Asian country and signed contracts for exchange of experience and cultural collaborations. And the main reason for the established link with Seoul is that they also have a Rose festival, about one week earlier than ours.
Our experience in Seoul back in 2017 was a great opportunity to see their way of holding such events and share cultural exchange. And although their roses are not oil bearing, it was another event showcasing the beauty of this majestic flower - the rose.
So what can I say in addition to that? I really cannot find the right words to express the atmosphere in the city of Kazanlak that’s in the air every year in the beginning of June. I’ll be happy if more people can come and experience her majesty-the Rose! And our oil bearing roses really have something special in their aroma!
Hope to see you around some day! 😉
All the photos in the post are taken by me, either with my DSLR camera or with my mobile phone.
Have a nice day!