Qualla: Sint-Niklaas

Sint-Niklaas: Introduction

Sun, 17 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Margaret II, Countess of Flanders, signed a charter in 1248 promising that a particular plot of land in the new parish of Sint-Niklaas would remain bare. Eight hundred years later, that promise is the reason a Flemish city of 83,000 people owns the largest market square in Belgium - 31,900 square meters of cobbled, open ground at the dead center of town. Once a year, in early September, the city fills that square with the baskets and burners of an international hot air balloon meeting, the Vredesfeesten, and the bare ground becomes a runway for things that float.

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Sint-Niklaas: A Countess Keeps Her Word

Sun, 17 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Sint-Niklaas - 'Saint Nicholas,' for the patron saint of the church the bishop of Tournai founded here in 1217 - grew up in the part of Flanders called the Waasland, between the river Scheldt and the river Durme. By 1241 it was the administrative center of the region. In 1248 Mar...

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Sint-Niklaas: An Easter Egg, a Christmas Tree, a Reputation

Sun, 17 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Sint-Niklaas does not shrink from the implication of having so much room. The city has at various points hosted the largest Christmas tree in Europe and, in 2005, the largest Easter egg - actual, recorded record-holders, the kind of stunt only a town with this much square footage...

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Sint-Niklaas: Mercator's Globes

Sun, 17 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

On the south side of the Grote Markt sits the Mercator Museum, dedicated to the cartographer Gerardus Mercator - whose projection still shapes how we draw the world on flat paper. The museum holds two original globes Mercator made in 1541 and 1551, one terrestrial and one celesti...

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Sint-Niklaas: May 1940

Sun, 17 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The 20th century touched Sint-Niklaas hard at the start of the Second World War. The Luftwaffe bombed the city four times in May 1940, opening with light incendiary bombs on the road from Ghent to Antwerp and escalating. The worst attack came at 12:30 on the 17th of May. Bombs hi...

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Sint-Niklaas: The Balloons in September

Sun, 17 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The Vredesfeesten - Peace Festival - opens the first weekend of September and turns the Grote Markt into a balloon field. Burners hiss. Envelopes inflate against the cobbles. Crowds press back to give the pilots room. The Villa Pace music festival runs three days alongside it. By...

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