Garden festival

A garden / flora festival or exposition is a festival and exposition held to celebrate the arts of gardening, garden design, landscaping and landscape architecture. There are local garden festivals, regional garden festivals, National Garden Festivals and International Garden Festivals. The idea probably originated with Germany's Bundesgartenschau. The UK held five garden festivals in the period 1984-92 but blundered through not planning an after-use for the festival grounds during their design and planning phase.

To qualify as an International Exhibition, a show must be recognised by the Bureau International des Expositions (BIE), which was established by a diplomatic international Convention, signed in Paris,in 1928. Shows can also be recognised by the International Association of Horticultural Producers (IAHP / AIPH). To qualify as a National Exhibition, a garden festival must be recognised by a national government.

Because garden design is becoming more popular and featuring on TV, there is an ever-growing number of garden festivals: permanent and temporary, official and non-official. One of the best known is International Garden Festival held on a permanent site at Chaumont in France. Despite the name, Chaumont does not come within the BIE definition of an 'international' festival. Other shows feature garden design but describe themselves as 'flower shows'. The best-known example in this category, the Chelsea Flower Show, emphasises garden design. It spun off a Chelsea Fringe events in 2012 which featured a variety of unusual gardens and gardening across London.

List of garden festivals

List of host nations and cities

Country	City	Festival name	Year(s)	Dates	Type	AIPH classification^[1]	BIE recognised^[2]
Netherlands	Rotterdam	Floriade 1960	1960		International	A1	Yes
Netherlands	Amsterdam	Floriade 1972	1972		International	A1	Yes
Netherlands	Amsterdam	Floriade 1982	1982		International	A1	Yes
United Kingdom	Liverpool	International Garden Festival	1984		International	A1	Yes
Japan	Osaka	Expo '90	1990	April 1 - September 30	International	A1	Yes
Netherlands	The Hague	Floriade 1992	1992		International	A1	Yes
United States of America	Columbus, Ohio	AmeriFlora '92	1992	April 3 to October 12	National		No
China	Kunming	1999 World Horticultural Exposition	1999	May 1 to October 31^[3]	International	A1	Yes
Netherlands	Haarlemmermeer	Floriade 2002	2002		International	A1	Yes
France	Dijon	Florissimo	2005		National	B2	No
Brazil	Festival de Holambra	Florissimo	2005		National	B2	Yes
China	Shenyang	International Horticultural Exposition 2006	2006	May 1 - October 31	International	A2/B1	No
Singapore	Singapore	Singapore Garden Festival	2006 and biennially since	December 16–25	International	n/a	No
Thailand	Chiang Mai	Royal Flora Ratchaphruek	2006–2007	November 1 - January 31	International	A1	Yes
France	Dijon	Florissimo	2010	March 11–21	National		No
Republic of China	Taipei	Taipei International Flora Exposition	2010–2011	November 6 - April 25	International	A2/B1	No
Australia	Melbourne	Melbourne International Flower and Garden Show	2011	March 30 - April 3	International	n/a	No
China	Xi'an	International Horticultural Exposition 2011	2011	April 22 - October 28	International	A2/B1	No
Netherlands	Venlo	Floriade 2012	2012		International	A1	Yes
South Korea	Suncheon	Suncheon International Garden Expo(Korea)	2013	April 20 - October 20	International	A1	Yes
China	Jinzhou	International Horticultural Exposition 2013	2013	May 10 - October 31	International	A2/B1	No
China	Qingdao	Qingdao International Horticultural Exposition 2014	2014	April 25 - October 25	International	A2/B1	No
France	Dijon	Florissimo	2015	March	National		No
Turkey	Antalya	Expo 2016	2016		International	A1	No
China	Tangshan	Tangshan International Horticultural Exposition 2016	2016	May - Oct	International	A2/B1	No^[4]