On Sunday I went to Den Bosch for the Boulevard Theater Festival and noticed something new in the marketplace—a tall tower made from cardboard boxes and sticky tape. A took a few pictures and didn’t give the matter much thought.
A few hours later, I returned to the market place and the people were busy throwing the remains of the tower in the back of a rubbish truck.
I later learned the full story about the cardboard tower.
Saint John’s Cathedral is a famous landmark that attracts a lot of visitors to Den Bosh, but the present-day tower is not the original one. In 1584 a fire broke out and the original tower, which had a more elaborate design collapsed upon the cathedral and destroyed much of the roof.
The cardboard tower in the marketplace was a replica of the original St John’s tower. It was erected on Saturday by local volunteers following the instructions of a French artist called Olivier Grossetête who has designed many similar cardboard structures and erected them other European cities.
The cardboard tower in Den Bosch was toppled and destroyed on Sunday afternoon at 5pm and, once again, the local townsfolk were there to lend a helping hand.
I did some searching and found a video that shows the tower being constructed. It looks like it took a lot of hard work—and a truckload of tape.
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