The Festival of Roses is already deep-rooted in Nova Gorica, the city of roses. The festival with its diverse programme attracts more and more visitors from near and far. During the month of May you can enjoy in the collection of bourbon roses, and the city rose gardens. Visitors can take part in workshops and lectures, look at the exhibition of photographs, taste delicious dishes with roses, relax in the wellness center and pamper themselves with cosmetic products based on rose essential oils.
Starring: old-fashioned belles
The main attraction of the festival will be again the old-fashioned belles, bourbon roses. The collection of bourbon roses in the garden of the Franciscan monastery in Kostanjevica will be open for visitors every day between 9 am and 5 pm. From April 25 till May 4 guided tours are organized at 11 am, the time when the scent of the roses is the strongest. Tours can be arranged at different times as well, weather permitting. The visitor can join a tour of the city rose gardens under professional guidance on Sunday, May 11, 2014. Those interested in the tour should gather at 10 am under the arcades of the town hall of the City Municipality of Nova Gorica.
Workshops and lectures
On Thursday, May 8, there will be a paper rose making workshop at the Sabotin Hotel in Solkan, with the instructor Ana Kerševan. Jožica Klančič Golob will lecture on roses and perennials on May 14 at 8 pm in the Eda Centre Hall; and in the same place on May 16 at 7 pm Edi Prošt, an expert on roses, and their great admirer, will lecture on how the best roses are chosen all over the world.
An evening among the bourbons
This year the Evening among the bourbons will be held on Tuesday, May 13 at 7 pm in the garden of the Franciscan Monastery in Kostanjevica, in the fragrant company of the bourbon roses. The event will be accompanied by the wind quintet SLOWIND, composed by the soloists of the Slovenia Philharmonic Orchestra.
Again in the garden of the Franciscan Monastery in Kostanjevica ex-tempore Among the bourbons took place on Monday, April 28, with the academic painter Jana Dolenc as mentor. The members of the Society for culture, tourism and development from Renče participated with their guests, members of the Society of painters from Tolmin. Their works will be presented at the joint exhibition opening on May 3 at 7 pm in the town hall of the City Municipality Nova Gorica.
On Wednesday, April 30 at 8 pm the exhibition of the photographs of the bourbon roses from the archives of the Gorica Rose Society was opened.
Dishes with roses, rose ice-cream, and rose ice tea
A compulsory part of the festival, as each year, are also different dishes with roses as ingredients, and their tasting – they will be served in the restaurant of the Sabotin Hotel in Solkan, and in the restaurant of the Lipa Hotel in Šempeter. In Perla's cafe Dolce Vita you will be able to taste delicious home-made ice-cream with roses, and in the bar at Plac besides Lipa Hotel you will be able to quench your thirst with tasteful ice tea made of roses.
The Rose Society of Gorica presently has more than 120 members, its own website www.vrtnice.info and FB-profile Festival vrtnic 2014 (Festival of Roses 2014). For this year they plan for their members and other people who love roses a number of visits to various rose gardens, several lectures, and they intend to continue their cooperation with Rozacco Abbey and rose lovers from Pordenone. They intend to organize a five-day guided professional field trip into the valley of roses in Bulgaria. In May a new folder on bourbon roses in several languages will be published, for which they joined forces with the Tourist Association of the Nova Gorica Tourist Information Centre. Within the SOLUM project they intend to present themselves in the shop/wine store in the Bevk Square. After the festival, on May 17 and 18, they will join the Festival of roses and flowers in Portorož and promote Nova Gorica, the city of roses.
Mojca Dumančič, TV Slovenija
Translated by G. K.
