Loy Krathong: The Flowers That Go on the Water
Banana trunk, folded banana leaf, marigold and orchid — how a krathong is built, what each part means, and the bread-based alternatives.
On the full moon of the twelfth lunar month — usually November — Thailand floats กระทง (krathong) on rivers, canals and every available body of water. It is the most photographed Thai festival after Songkran, and unlike most festivals here, the flowers are structural rather than decorative.
What a krathong is
A small float, traditionally built on a slice of banana trunk — buoyant, biodegradable, and available everywhere. The trunk is wrapped and pinned with folded banana leaf, then decorated with flowers, a candle and three incense sticks.
The candle and incense are lit and the krathong is set on the water, carrying away misfortune from the past year. Many people include a coin, a strand of hair or a clipped fingernail — something of themselves to be released with it.
The flowers, and what they mean
ดาวเรือง (marigold) — the most common. Gold-coloured, associated with prosperity and used across Thai religious practice. Cheap, robust, and holds up on water.
ดอกบัว (lotus) — the most symbolically significant. The lotus grows from mud into clean flower and is the central Buddhist image of purity emerging from difficulty. A lotus bud at the centre of a krathong is the traditional focal point.
กล้วยไม้ (orchid) — widely used, durable, and available year-round in Thailand.
ดอกรัก (crown flower) — the name รัก means love. Small, white-purple, frequently used in folded decorative work.
Chrysanthemum and gerbera appear in modern krathong for colour.
The banana leaf itself is folded into repeating pointed forms — กลีบ (klip) — pinned with small wooden pins. The folding is a genuine craft, taught in schools, and the neatness of the folds is what separates a good krathong from a rough one.
Making one
If you want to make rather than buy:
- Cut a banana trunk slice 3–5 cm thick, 15–20 cm across.
- Cut banana leaf into strips, roughly 5 cm wide, and wipe them clean.
- Fold the klip — a simple version is a triangle folded from a rectangle — and pin them overlapping around the edge of the trunk slice, all pointing the same way.
- Cover the top surface with a leaf circle.
- Add flowers, working from a central focal point outward. Marigold heads pack well; lotus goes in the centre.
- Fix a candle in the middle and three incense sticks beside it.
It takes about thirty minutes once you can fold. Children are taught this at school and are usually better at it than adults.
The environmental question
Loy Krathong generates an enormous amount of waste in a single night — Bangkok collects hundreds of thousands of krathong from its waterways each year.
Traditional materials — banana trunk, leaf, flowers, wooden pins — are entirely biodegradable and are not the problem. Styrofoam bases and plastic pins are, and they are still widely sold. Avoid them.
Bread krathong are common now, made from a compressed bread base that fish eat. They are practical, though large numbers of them in one canal cause their own water-quality issues. A traditional banana-trunk krathong remains the best option.
Digital krathong — floating one on an app — has become genuinely popular, particularly in Bangkok. Older Thais are more sanguine about this than you might expect.
Where to float in Bangkok
The Chao Phraya at the main piers, Benjakitti and Lumpini parks, the canals in the old city, and essentially every hotel with a pool or pond. Expect crowds and expect it to take a while.
What we make
We build traditional krathong to order in the week before the festival — banana trunk and leaf, marigold, lotus and orchid, wooden pins, no styrofoam. For offices and hotels running staff events we make them in quantity.
They need ordering about a week ahead; lotus in particular sells out. Tell us how many and when.