Photography by Trudy Rass
If it’s April in Augusta, then it must be time the Garden City Festival.
The Garden City Festival at Sacred Heart is a spring celebration with strong roots in the area.
This two-day event will feature a wheelbarrow full of fun for those with or without a green thumb at Sacred Heart Cultural Center Friday, April 21 and Saturday, April 22. The annual festival also features tours of gardens that normally are not open to the public.
Festival-goers can gaze at landscape and floral exhibits; discover hard-to-find plants, garden accessories and decorative items in the Garden Market; and listen to experts in the fields of plants, garden design and eco-friendly living as part of the speaker series.
In Wandering Workshops, vendors will teach mini-sessions on various topics with pop-up demos. These quick sessions, located in the courtyard across from the speaker stage, will offer “how-tos” and valuable garden information.
On Seedling Saturday, families can garden together in hands-on activities such as planting sprouted seeds, making seed balls and learning different ways to start seeds. (Admission for children 12 and under is free with a ticketed adult.)
Food and beverage vendors will be on hand as well. Breakfast items will be available inside Sacred Heart’s Great Hall from 9 a.m. – noon Friday and Saturday, and lunch will be sold at food trucks outside the venue from 11 a.m. – 2 p.m. both days.
Tickets for the festival can be purchased by calling (706) 826-4700, online at sacredheartaugusta.org or at Sacred Heart and various locations in the area.
For those who want to branch out from the festival itself, other related events will take place at Sacred Heart as well.
A preview party is scheduled for 6 p.m. Thursday, April 20. Tickets are $75 per person, and the event will include shopping, dinner and music. For reservations, call (706) 826-4700.
An evening garden social, featuring a catered barbecue dinner, music by The Mason Jars and dancing, will be held 5 p.m. – 9 p.m. Friday, April 21.
