King Willem-Alexander is to break with the tradition developed by his mother for what was then Queen’s Day and introduce his own take on the celebrations.

Instead of visiting two towns or villages on King’s Day and taking part in traditional games, the family will now visit one regional centre. The chosen town or city will organise a ‘grand parade’ or similar event to profile itself to the rest of the country which the royal family will watch, the king said.

Queen Beatrix introduced the visits and informal walk-abouts when she took over the throne, scrapping the formal file-pasts at Soestdijk palace introduced by her mother Juliana.

The first new-style King’s Day event will take place in Dordrecht on April 27, 2015.