My name is Daniela and I run the Hotel Noucentista, a few steps from the sea. From my windows I watch the seasons roll through my small town, and if there is one I wait for every year, it is the season of flowers. In Sitges a flower is not simply something you set down on a table: it carries an old story, made of patient hands, of petals counted one by one and of a Mediterranean light that makes the colours vibrate. And that story comes with a date I want to give you straight away: the great flower celebration, Corpus, takes place in June.
Over the Corpus weekend and the days around it, the streets of the historic centre vanish under petals, and the town hosts the Exposició Nacional de Clavells at the same time, the national carnation show. It does not last long: a few days, once a year. Plenty of visitors only find out once they are back home, so I would rather say it in the very first lines. If you want to see Sitges at its most flowery, this is the moment to aim for.
How the Flower Carpets Are Made
It all starts the night before the feast. Families, neighbours and local associations work side by side to compose the famous catifes de flors (carpets of flowers), the petal carpets that cover the streets of the historic centre. The patterns are outlined on the ground first, then each shape is filled in with petals, very often carnation petals, laid out colour by colour. The result looks like a huge living mosaic, and you can admire it for a single day before the procession and the visitors’ footsteps gently rub it away.
The figures are dizzying: hundreds of thousands of petals go into dressing the centre and its displays. Behind that number lie weeks of preparation, buckets of petals sorted by hand and a good many cheerful sleepless nights. I always suggest coming early in the morning: the light is soft, the carpets are untouched, and you still bump into the night’s craftspeople finishing their work, fingers stained red and white. That is the hour when my small town is at its most moving.
The Carnation, Emblem Flower, and the Exposició Nacional de Clavells
If Sitges had an official flower, it would be the carnation without a moment’s hesitation, the clavell (carnation in Catalan). The flower has gone hand in hand with the feast for a very long time, and it even gave rise to an event of its own: the Exposició Nacional de Clavells, held since the early twentieth century. Varieties in outspoken colours are shown and honoured there, celebrating horticultural know-how the area has cultivated for more than a century. It is a local pride passed on like an inheritance.
I like reminding my guests that this tradition is nothing rigid. The carnation is still a popular, almost homely flower, and that is exactly what makes it endearing. You find it in the florists of the old town, on market stalls, in the plain bunches people here give each other for no particular reason. In Sitges, giving carnations is not old-fashioned at all: it is a local gesture, a nod to the feast around the corner.
Flower-Filled Balconies and Old Town Florists
The celebration does not stay at ground level. Look up and you will see balconies dressed with flowers, windows hung with garlands and patios thrown open for a competition, revealing courtyards you would never guess at from the street. These floral displays carry the feast upwards and turn a simple stroll into a run of small discoveries. I love getting lost in the lanes of the centre at that time, with no route in mind, just to see what each corner has in store. And for the rest of the year those same balconies keep their rows of geranium pots against the whitewash: that is the signature of the streets here, feast or no feast.
It is also the best way to meet the florists of old Sitges. Houses such as Floristeria Mirabent and Floristeria Isabel are part of the local landscape: carnations, advice on varieties, and that knowledge of dates and customs which is worth its weight in gold as the feast draws near. Walking over to them you also pass the design shops of the old town, where craft and interiors echo the floral spirit of the town. Take your time: nobody here buys flowers in a hurry.
Coming to See the Flowers of Sitges
If you dream of seeing the carnation carpets with your own eyes, note it down now: everything happens in June, and it is one of the liveliest stretches of the year. The centre fills up fast, and the rooms with it, so it pays to plan well ahead if you want to enjoy the moment calmly. Do write to me before your stay: I will gladly point you to the best streets for admiring the catifes, the times of the procession and the florists worth the detour. Every year, when the last petals blow away, I think the same thing: Sitges is never more itself than under a blanket of flowers, and I would love to show you, a carnation in hand.
