Each year, the Valletta Green Festival transforms one of the largest open urban spaces in Valletta, Pjazza San Ġorġ, with its colourful signature feature – a huge floral carpet composed of some 150,000 potted plants. A yearly programme of family-friendly activities happening in the capital city and other localities have established this much-loved weekend-long festival as a fun and accessible platform for initiatives promoting environmental consciousness on the Maltese Islands.
Happening between the 3rd and the 6th of May 2018, the festival also offers visitors rare glimpses into some of the capital city’s little-known historical treasures, including the four-hundred-year-old gardens of the Archbishop’s Palace and the Convent of St Catherine.
This year, the square will be transformed into an actual garden, where the public can walk through St George’s Square amongst the flowers.
A Roof Garden (open until the 13th May) will be set up on the Main Guard’s roof, so as to give citizens of Valletta and Malta an idea on how to set up one of their own. Upon descending from the roof, a stand will serve to explain how this roof garden can be set up, and examples on how a roof garden will be set up at the Valletta Design Cluster.
During the Valletta Green Festival, the Valletta 2018 Foundation in collaboration with Nextbike, will be offering Festival visitors a voucher code (863386) to redeem twice a day for the duration of the Festival to make use of a bike to go around Valletta. Visit the following page for more information.
Solar Cinema will be offering stop-motion film workshops for children that bear a green theme thanks to the use of recycled materials. The workshops will be held during the Festival on the 3, 4, and 5th May between 9am-12.30pm.
Find below a programme of events:
Thursday 3rd May:
Green Roof will be open from 9.30am – 7.30pm
St. George’s Square will be open from 9:30am – 20:00pm
Exhibition tents: Solar Cinema & NGO’s (Birdlife, Żibel, Sharklab, Gaia Foundation) + China Cultural Centre in Malta + Waste Serve + ELC + Garby & Tidy + National Parks + ERA 9.30am onwards
Friday 4th May:
Green Roof and St George’s Square open as above
& the below will be open from 9.30am – 12.30 & 4pm – 7pm
St. Dominic’s Garden (entrance to St Dominic’s Garden & the old refectory – recently restored to its original form – will be from St Dominic’s Street)
St. Augustine Church & Garden + foundations of recently discovered church (entrance to garden from Old Bakery Street, while entrance from Old Mint Street will lead to church foundations then the garden – part of the newly discovered church will also be visible from here)
St. Catherine’s Monastery (entrance to the basement level from St Christopher’s street, with access to the garden where one will be able to see the area once used as a cell and the crypt)
Archbishop’s Palace & Garden (Entrance from Archbishop Street and Old Mint Street. Ground floor level, garden and underground water cisterns with the only fresh water stream in Valletta will be open to the public)
Saturday 5th May:
Green Roof and St George’s Square open as above
Gardens and Palace open as above
+
Xarulù will be entertaining the crowd for 2 hours in the morning: moving from Parliament to St George’s Square 10am – noon
Solar Cinema will be screening a short film including what was produced in the workshops, in the square from 8:30PM onwards
Sunday 6th May:
Green Roof and St George’s Square open as above
Gardens and Palace open as above
The Roof Garden at the Main Guard will be open from Thursday 3rd May until Sunday 13th May and is open between 9.30am-12.30pm & 12.30 – 7pm. The project is a Valletta 2018 collaboration with the Maltese Archdiocese, the Ministry for Sustainable Development, The Environment and Climate Change; the Environmental Landscaping Consortium (ELC); the PARKS Department , as part of the Tree 4 U (34U) campaign; WasteServ Malta Ltd; European Green Week and several local environmental NGOs.
NGO tents schedule as below:
Thursday 3rd May
09:00 – 12:00 Solar Cinema – stop motion film workshops workshops for children that focus on utilizing recycled materials for art.
12:00 – 16:00 BirdLife Malta – educational displays on wildlife habitats
16:00 – 20:00 SharkLab Malta – educational displays on their research conducted with sharks, rays, and skates in Malta
Friday 4th May
09:00 – 12:00 Solar Cinema – stop motion film workshops workshops for children that focus on utilizing recycled materials for art (fully booked)
12:00 – 16:00 SharkLab – educational displays on their research conducted with sharks, rays, and skates in Malta
16:00 – 20:00 BirdLife Malta – educational displays on wildlife habitat
Saturday 5th May
09:00 – 12:00 Solar Cinema – stop motion film workshops workshops for children that focus on utilizing recycled materials for art. (fully booked)
12:00 – 16:00 Żibel/The Gaia Foundation – workshops: Both NGOs will host a collaborative and interactive sign painting workshop. The signs will be painted on drift wood collected from the clean ups conducted by Zibel and will be placed around beautiful parts of the island encouraging people to keep Malta clean.
16:00 – 20:00 BirdLife Malta/SharkLab Malta – 17:00 – 18:00 Educational talk about the ocean as a habitat. This talk will discuss the ocean as a habitat from the perspective of BirdLife Malta’s LIFE Arċipelagu Garnija project and Sharklab.
The LIFE Arċipelagu Garnija project aims at securing the Maltese Islands for the Yelkouan Shearwater.
Sharklab Malta aims to increase knowledge about elasmobranchs, better conservation and education in Malta and the Mediterranean.
Sunday 6th May
09:00 – 14:30 BirdLife Malta/SharkLab Malta – Workshops/talks: 11:00 – 12:00: Planting Workshop. Plant flowers with BirdLife Malta and help create essential habitats for insects that rely on pollen to survive.
14:30 – 20:00 Żibel/The Gaia Foundation – Focus: There will be educational displays from both NGOs. The Gaia Foundation will focus on indigenous and endemic plant ecology and invasive species, and will offer an introduction to their volunteer program. Żibel will focus on their recent experience and findings from both terrestrial and marine clean ups, and the current issues with micro plastics in the Mediterranean.