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A new competition is taking the Netherlands by storm. Tile whipping or Tegelwippen in Dutch is a national contest that is designed to restore greenery and help the country reach its climate targets.
This lighthearted competition to see who can remove the most paving tiles in their garden, which is now in its 4 th year, will run until the end of October, 2024, according to Positive News.
“The competition is a gimmick of course,” Frank Lee, creative director Eva Braaksma and the person who fired the starter pistol for the contest told Positive news. “People really like to compete! But the power of the thing is its simplicity. You just pick up your shovel and get started.”
More than 11 million tiles that amount to hundreds of acres have been removed and replaced with trees, flower beds, and vegetable gardens since its inception.
How Tegelwippen began
Tegelwippen is the brainchild of Remco Moen Marcar, reported The Guardian. He came up with the idea during the Covid pandemic when people were at home and there were no football championships.
“So we thought: let’s host one [a competition] between Rotterdam and Amsterdam, our clients,” Marcar told The Guardian. “One always wants to be the best when it comes to soccer, so let’s use this as an incentive for people in those cities to clear the tiles out of their garden.
“You’re a happier person when you live in a green surrounding, so every slab you flip is 900 square centimeters of potential happiness. You’re also healthier and, if that’s not enough, there are the big problems we are facing with climate change.”
The competition is helping to reverse the trend of gardens getting smaller in the Netherlands. Another added bonus is that removing paving will help reduce flooding. With heavy rainfall events getting more frequent due to climate change, more open spaces and green roofs are badly needed.
How to participate in the contest
Removing paving slabs is not that easy. After removing the tile, around 30 cm of sand and dirt also has to be shoveled out and replaced with healthy soil, according to Positive News. Local municipalities pick up the discarded tiles in designated “tile taxis.” Concrete, tarmac, and gravel also count towards the official total with the winning municipality receiving the sought after “Gold Tile.”
People who participate are encouraged to submit photos of the spaces they have transformed. Every month a panel of judges selects the best and awards the coveted title Whipper of the Month. One winner was Jelmer from Groningen, in the north of the Netherlands, who removed slabs to create an edible garden of herbs, lettuce, squash, and fruit.
For now, the contest is limited to people’s own private space, it’s not for people to pull up public pavements. May the best tile whippers win!
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