The date is chosen because of the birthday of Queen Juliana (1909) and the accession of Queen Beatrix (1980).
The color orange is a common sight on Queen's day, as it represents the "House of Orange" which is the name of the current Dutch dynasty. There are orange banners and flags, and sometimes the water in fountains are even dyed.
On Queen's Day citizens do not need a permit to sell goods on the street. On this day the country turns into one big flea market, on which everybody can sell second hand trinkets they no longer use.
The (rest of the) day is reserved for an open air party. Especially Amsterdam has a reputation for celebrating Queen's Day and generally draws somewhere between 500.000 and 2 million tourists from the rest of the country.
Since Queen's Day is a national holiday lots of people also go out and party on the Eve of Queen's Day (called Koninginnenach in the Hague dialect).
The current monarch, Queen Beatrix, visits towns on Queen's Day where she is received with special celebrations, often in the form of demonstrations of old-fashioned dances and crafts.
Activities