Floriade 2019
By Lily Pass
Floriade has been and gone for another year, bringing with it the sunshine, the elaborate flower designs and a wide variety of food, drink and shopping stalls. This year, Floriade began on Saturday the 14th of September and to farewell Floriade for 2019, Sunday the 13th of October, dogs were welcome to come and join the fun amongst the flowers for a day out with the whole family.
The artsy Floriade banner for 2019 cleverly incorporated a variety of iconic Canberra scenes within its design. I found that this made it a highly popular backdrop for photographs, whether they be selfies for social media or just as a memory with family and friends. A few of these iconic scenes included the rainbow roundabout in Braddon, Black Mountain Tower, Parliament House and the National Carillon.
I was slightly disappointed with the 2019 Floriade as Floriade is renowned as Canberra’s very own flower festival, yet the collection of flowers seemed smaller than it had in previous years. The number of food and market stalls has increased throughout the years as well. As much as I like buying from and supporting local business, I also enjoy walking amongst a mass of flowers at this novelty event. I have found that a number of people have expressed similar concerns. Floriade is beginning to lose the spectacular mass of flowers and intricate designs and it will be a true shame if this continues. It also did not seem as easy to make out the patterns in each flower bed from eye level, so you had to ride the Ferris Wheel to truly appreciate the intricate flower designs.
As you walked around Floriade, a limited number of brightly coloured paddle boats could be seen on Lake Burley Griffin. This was to announce the return of public access to paddle boats as another way to get active and see the sights of Canberra, the boats are set to be available for public access during the Summer of 2019 and I am excited to experience Canberra in a new and colourful way.
This is my beagle Louie at dog’s day out, which was a spectacular end to Floriade 2019. I am a super massive fan of dogs in all shapes and sizes so for me, this was a day I could not miss. A whole new variety of stalls and activities were present in order to cater to pets of all shapes and sizes. Louie was also able to enjoy a whole new variety of smells, from other dogs to sweet flowers to all the treats he accidentally stole from other dog owners. With dachshund races and doggy modelling, to treats, toys and accessories stalls, there was something to enjoy for all pooches and pet owners.
Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed Floriade this year and will continue to go in future years; however, I would like to see a major increase in the actual number of flowers. The food, stores and rides were all very reasonably priced and I found to be high quality. I was highly intrigued reading about each of the intricate flower designs as well as the design of the artsy Floriade banner. Floriade is worth seeing and makes for a bright and colourful day out for families, individuals and pets. Seeing Louie so excited from the moment he hopped out of the car made me just as excited that I was able to bring him to an event such as this, I know he absolutely loved it and I did too.