Next: 21 to 27 Mar 2027
Holy Week carpets of Antigua
Families lay carpets of dyed sawdust, flowers and pine needles for Holy Week processions to walk over.
What happens
During Holy Week the cobbled streets of Antigua Guatemala are covered with alfombras, carpets made by the households along the route of each procession. Some are laid with dyed sawdust pressed through stencils. Others are made of flowers, pine needles, fruit and vegetables. A family may work through the night on a carpet that lasts a few hours. When the procession arrives, the men carrying the heavy float of Christ walk straight across it, and the carpet is gone. The longest processions are on Good Friday.
The flowers
Also part of it, and being written: Sawdust carpet (Dyed sawdust laid through stencils, often edged with flowers.), Bougainvillea (Its bracts give strong pink and purple.), Pine (Green needles make the base of many carpets.).
Original text by the Phool desk, written with AI assistance. Background: "Sawdust carpet" on Wikipedia. Customs differ from family to family and place to place. If we have something wrong, tell us.
Photo credits on this page
The small pictures above come from Wikimedia Commons under free licences. Some are cropped to fit.
- Chrysanthemum: Muhammad Mahdi Karim, GFDL 1.2, source
- Alfombras: Rosalba Muñoz RomeroLia, CC BY-SA 3.0, source