HGTV Is Partnerting With Disney Destinations For This Year's Flower and Garden Festival

I love Disney theme parks, and I watch HGTV very often. So this, to me, is my perfect match. HGTV is partnering with Disney Destinations in sponsoring this year's Flower and Garden Festival at Epcot, as revealed in this press release:

New York, N.Y. [For Immediate Release—February 8, 2011] HGTV and Disney Destinations, LLC, have signed a multi-year partnership marketing agreement that will leverage the popularity of HGTV’s lifestyle content and expertise in-park. Beginning March 2, 2011, the 75-day The Epcot® International Flower & Garden Festival presented by HGTV will feature appearances by star designers on the HGTV Stage in the Festival Center, including Genevieve Gorder, Lisa LaPorta, Kim Myles, Brian Patrick Flynn, Taniya Nayak, Ahmed Hassan, Patti Moreno, Michele Beschen, John Gidding, Frank Fontana, and Vern Yip. HGTV also will support its sponsorship of the Epcot International Flower & Garden Festival with a promotional campaign on the network and website.

During the festival, HGTV will sponsor the newly-expanded Bambi’s Butterfly House located along the Future World Imagination Walkway. HGTV also will present a year-round garden in Epcot’s World Showcase. As part of the partnership, the Festival Center’s HGTV Theater will feature a special-engagement film highlighting tips and hints from HGTV programs.

“We are thrilled to welcome HGTV and so many of the network’s great Talent to Epcot this spring,” said Dan Cockerell, vice president, Epcot. “HGTV’s design and gardening personalities add an exciting and entertaining new element to a festival that reinvents itself year after year.”

In addition to its own celebrity stage appearances, HGTV also will sponsor the popular twice-daily Disney Gardening at Home series, where guests can join a workshop and take home projects ranging from hanging baskets to water garden features. In September, HGTV’s designers will return to the HGTV Stage during the Epcot International Food & Wine Festival with weekend appearances.

“People visit Disney for a memorable experience where they are inspired, enlightened and entertained,” said Jim Samples, president, HGTV. “Our star designers will provide just such an experience for the Disney guest. Disney is the ideal venue and destination for us to connect face-to-face with our passionate viewers.”

In its 18th year, the Epcot International Flower & Garden Festival presented by HGTV will bring back by popular demand dozens of Disney character topiaries. Also, Woody, Buzz Lightyear and chief villain Lotso of the Oscar-nominated Disney blockbuster, “Toy Story 3,” make their first topiary appearance in front of Spaceship Earth at the park’s front-entrance garden. Topiary craftsmen also will debut floral versions of Lightning McQueen and Mater, stars of “Cars 2,” to be released in theaters this June.

Flower Power concerts will rock the open-air America Gardens Theatre stage three times each Friday, Saturday and Sunday evening with popular acts like Davy Jones and Chubby Checker & The Wildcats. New-to-the-festival performers will include Melissa Manchester and Marilyn McCoo & Billy Davis Jr.

Too bad I won't be there this year. I would have loved to meet Genevieve Gorder and John Gidding. I have been dying to ask Genevieve about that moss thing she put on the wall in one episode of Trading Spaces. :)

Zz.