The Panagbenga Festival is held yearly during the month of February. The celebrations are held for over a month and peak periods are the weekends. The Panagbenga Festival showcases the many floral floats and native dances. The fragrant smells that could be presently teasing olfactory senses are probably less from the now-dried flowers from Valentine's Day than air floating all the way from Baguio City.
Panagbenga is a kankanaey term for "a season of blooming." It is also known as the Baguio Flower Festival, a homage to the beautiful flowers the city is famous for as well as a celebration of Baguio's re-establishment. Since February 1995, it has been held to help Baguio forget the 1990 earthquake that distressed much of the city.
Aside from economic boosts from tourism, the festival also helped the younger generation of indigenous people to rediscover their culture's old traditions. The indigenous people was first wary with government-led tourism because of the threat that they will interfere or change their communities' rituals.
The Panagbenga Festival, formerly as the Baguio Flower Festival, was formed in 1995 as the brainchild of Attorney Damaso Bangaoet Jr. of the John Hay Poro Point Development Corporation (JPDC) and Victor A. Lim of the Bases Conversion Development Authority (BCDA). Entries from the annual Camp John Hay art contest gave its official logo: a spray of sunflowers. The festival was set in February to boost tourism as it was considered as a month of inactivity between the busy days of Christmas season and the Holy Week and the summer season.
source: wilkipedia
