Azalea Festival 2008
March 15 - 16 2008
Free Admission
2008 Festival Schedule
For decades, Valdosta, Georgia, has been known as "The Azalea City" because of its luxuriant plantings of azaleas that provide mounds of beautiful blooms in the spring. In March of 2000, resident Joanne Griner met with three employees of the Valdosta-Lowndes County Conference Center and Tourism Authority who believed with her that the often-heard "We should have an azalea festival" was an idea whose time had come! Griner, Hilda Seymore, Beverly Pitzing and Andrea Cole began to recruit other "do-ers" in the community with event-production experience: Randall McClellan, Lena Bosch, Martha Gibson, Patsy Giles, Suzannah Patterson and Cheryl Marshall. Others came on board to form a grass-roots committee to apply for incorporation and tax-exempt status, enlist sponsors and develop events and activities to attract the public.
On March 17, 2001, the first-ever Valdosta-Lowndes Azalea Festival was born, attracting 8-10,000 people to beautiful Drexel Park. The park is named for a city employee who was instrumental in propagating azaleas and promoting their planting back in the 40’s and 50’s. Each following year has seen the addition of activities and expansion of festival hours. Azalea Festival 2005 saw nearly 35,000 folks enjoy circus acts, arts and crafts, music, food, KidZone, road races and more from Saturday through Sunday afternoon.
estival 2006 saw the expansion to two weekends with the addition of the Fine Arts Affair in beautiful downtown Valdosta on March 4th. The Asian Cultural Experience Festival also took place that day at the Valdosta Conference Center, followed by the International Folk Dance Competition on the 5th.