Rain or shine, Anne Castellow wasn't going to miss this year's displaced Atlanta Dogwood Festival, which kicked off Friday in the parking lot of Lenox Square.

"I'm not going to let the drought keep me away," said the 27-year-old Atlanta native, alluding to the city's decision to move the festival out of Atlanta's premier park because of Georgia's epic drought.

Hyosub Shin/AJC (ENLARGE)
Hundreds of people flood the Lenox Square parking lot for the Atlanta Dogwood Festival, which was forced to find an alternate location to Piedmont Park because of the drought.
Hyosub Shin/AJC (ENLARGE)
Glenn Payne waits for customers. Festival organizers had 80 days to pull off the move after the city announced in January that it could not use Piedmont Park.
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"But hopefully next year, it will be back in Piedmont Park where it belongs."

And the people said, amen.

Castellow echoed the sentiment of the few hundred people who strolled the tent-lined parking lot Friday while munching on funnel cakes, hot dogs and barbecue. The festival continues through Sunday.

"I prefer to be in Piedmont Park, but I think they did a good job of moving it here," Carmen Smith said as she chopped beef for cheese steaks behind the counter of her mobile mini-restaurant. "At least they didn't cancel the whole thing."

It wasn't easy. City officials announced in January that Dogwood and three other large festivals were being moved out of Piedmont Park for the sake of its drought-stressed lawn. That left Dogwood organizers just 80 days to find a new home for the 72-year-old event.

"It took a great team to pull this off," said Brian Hill, executive director of the Dogwood Festival. Hill is one of about 100 staffers who have been on site 24/7 since Monday.

The crew worked day and night readying the first-time site for a live music stage, tons of fair-style food and a sea of white tents featuring local and regional artists.

The last-minute move brought obvious logistical challenges, Hill said, but some benefits — mainly, more parking and access to two Marta stations.

Another first: Though the event is free, festival-goers can pay $30 to enter a special tent featuring private bathrooms, restaurant food and a full bar.

Hill said he wanted to get through this weekend before thinking about where to put next year's festival, which will likely be held later in April.

"One thing's for sure, we're going to have two locations" lined up well in advance, Hill said.

He also is pressuring the city to guarantee the event can move to Piedmont once drought conditions improve. If the move truly was necessitated by the drought, he said, "they should be able to make that guarantee."

Greg Pridgeon, Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin's chief of staff, has said the decision will be made at a later date.

Many people admitted they preferred Piedmont's lush lawn to the mall's damp parking lot.

"This atmosphere just isn't what we expected," said Edith Duff, who came with a group of friends from Fayetteville. "We'd rather be in the park."

Maria-Louise Coil said business was brisk at her booth, where she's selling paintings of local landmarks like the Big Chicken and the Varsity.

"It would have been great to have it at the park," Coil said, "but as far as a solution, I think this is a pretty good one."