In Frames: Tomatina Festival 2024 in Spain

Tomatina Tomato Fight Fiesta, a traditional tomato-throwing festival held annually in Bunol, Spain. Some 22,000 participants wearing white clothes bespattered with tomato pulp engaged in the frenzy that grips every year in the last week of August.

The streets of a town in eastern Spain were awash in red on Wednesday (August 28, 2024), as revellers flung overripe tomatoes at each other in a high-spirited battle royale during the traditional Tomatina festival.

Some 22,000 participants wearing white clothes bespattered with tomato pulp engaged in the frenzy that grips Bunol —located 40 km (25 miles) to the west of Valencia — every year in the last week of August.

According to Tomatina’s official website, the festival originated during a brawl that ensued in 1945 when youngsters attempting to get a closer view of a parade knocked over one of the participants. Several people plucked tomatoes from a nearby stand as makeshift projectiles until police restored order.

The following year, youths recreated the altercation, with some even bringing their own tomatoes. The event was briefly outlawed in the 1950s under General Francisco Franco’s fascist dictatorship but resumed in 1959 with certain rules.