Inside the Rubenshuis garden and Antwerp's forgotten tulip mania
- maxwell museums
- 2 days ago
- 4 min read
Updated: 6 hours ago
The Rubenshuis museum in Antwerp has returned Peter Paul Rubens' garden back to its 17th-century splendour. And thanks to extensive research during the project, curators have unearthed a previously-unknown Belgium tulip mania to rival the famed craze in neighbouring Netherlands.
IMO, spring is the most wonderful time of the year.
So when I was offered the chance to go on a trip that combined the springtime and one of Europe’s greatest artists, I grabbed my passport.
I headed on Eurostar to a Northern European country that in the 17th century was in the grip of tulip mania. No, not the Netherlands — but Belgium. My destination was Antwerp.
Springtime in Antwerp: A city in bloom and history
It turns out that Belgium’s second city (and a city I love) also went loopy for tulips just like the Dutch did in the 1630s. But this fascinating fact has only just been discovered. Before now, no one knew tulips were ‘a thing’ in Antwerp.
I heard about it while at the newly restored garden of the great European master Peter Paul Rubens. The Rubenshuis museum is situated on the site of the artist’s former townhouse, although the building itself is currently closed for extensive renovations that will last until at least 2030.
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While this overhaul is going on however, the museum has taken the opportunity to restore Rubens’ actual garden to its 17th-century splendour. The fully-enclosed urban oasis reopened in its replanted form in summer 2024, but my trip marked the first time where the garden — and its all-important tulips — could be seen in springtime bloom.
Unearthing Antwerp's forgotten tulip mania
What I wasn’t expecting however, was to hear the story of how the redesign of this historic garden in Antwerp ultimately unearthed the previously unknown Antwerp Tulipmania.
The Rubenshuis garden curator Klara Alen has dug deep to make this garden authentic. And it was in this research she found that the tulip bulb market was every bit as crazed as in Dutch cities.
She discovered there was even a thriving black market that saw the bulbs traded for more than gold. Rubens himself might have been involved in this illicit trade, as Klara found that the city’s most notorious tulip dealers all had links to him, and that they met just meters from his home.
Who were these characters? They included Rubens’s brewer, Hendrick Stockmans, as well as collectors Antonio de Tassis, Gaspar Charles, and Peter Hannekart, Rubens’s brother-in-law. These were men with contacts and cash to burn according to the museum.
Klara is still researching whether Rubens had a hand in these dealings. But we do know he loved tulips. They grew in Rubens’ garden and were also featured in his paintings, such as in The Walk in the Garden where he painted a large bed of tulips blooms. In fact this 1630 painting is a very important piece of European tulip history, as it's the most representative source of what Rubens garden looked like during his lifetime. It is the only surviving depiction of it from his own hand, and was a major source of Klara's research.
To fill in the rest of the missing gaps, Klara studied other historical documents in the nearby Plantin-Moretus Museum, which houses one of the greatest historical print collections in the world and is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
One of the most important books she examined — and which I was lucky enough to see alongside her on my trip — is 1613’s Hortus Eystettensis. Featuring 1,000 stunning botanical images, only 300 copies were ever printed. It was eye-wateringly expensive at the time, but Rubens bought one. It was the only botanical book in his collection. While the museum’s copy is not the one owned by Rubens, it’s very closely linked. The Plantin-Moretus archive has the ledger of his purchase.
I spent a fascinating morning getting up-close to this and the many other documents Klara studied. A trip to the garden and a trip to see books, prints and archives that are hundreds of years old: very, very good for the soul.
Why the Rubenshuis garden is a must-visit
Which is all to say that as we enter the final weeks of spring, the infinite value of museums and heritage bloom on. Not only does the Rubenshuis garden tick the boxes of what a heritage site should be — a place that can make you think, feel, or just escape modern life for a hot minute — it’s also is a reminder that major chapters of history are still being dug up by curious minds.
I think that’s worth shouting from the rooftops — or whispering to your friends on a visit to this remarkable oasis of art and nature.
The Rubenshuis garden is open to public daily except on Wednesdays. Tickets are available to visit the garden on its own, or a special combined ticket includes access to the new Rubens Experience on site. The artist's residence is closed for renovations until 2030. The Rubenshuis is a 10-minute walk from Antwerp-Central railway station.
I was guest of Visit Flanders and Visit Antwerp
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