I hope you’ve all had a magical past month, just as I have. Recently, I visited Walt Disney World to experience its 2025 EPCOT International Festival of the Arts.
Disney’s Festival of the Arts celebrates culinary, visual and performing arts. Every year, it is held from early January to late February. This year, the event lasted from Jan. 17 to Feb. 24. I was able to experience the festival on Feb. 7 when I visited Epcot.
Guests visiting the festival are treated to live performances, sidewalk drawings, live painting shows and décor, as well as the opportunity to participate in a special scavenger hunt. In this activity, guests visit specific vendors and order designated foods to collect stamps on a provided card, ultimately earning an adorable character-themed bowl.
Figment, a whimsical purple dragon, has been an EPCOT icon since its opening in 1982. He has served as the festival’s mascot since its inaugural event in 2017.
Eight years later, is the festival worth the price of admission? To find out, I went to EPOCT myself to see the Festival of the Arts.
The day was moderately warm and somewhat crowded (as expected), but it was still amazing. The first thing I did was visit Disney on Broadway’s 30th-anniversary exhibit, which features authentic costumes and props from several Disney Broadway musicals, such as “The Lion King,” “Beauty and the Beast,” “Mary Poppins,” “The Little Mermaid” and my personal favorite – “Aladdin!” I was also happy to see items from “Newsies,” a highly underrated original musical.
The Broadway exhibit was my absolute favorite part of the festival. Seeing the costumes and concept art for the costumes was absolutely magical. My personal favorite Disney character of all time is Jafar, and seeing the majestic, gorgeous black robes – once worn by Jonathan Freeman himself – was incredible. The concept art for his costume was just as impressive.
After the exhibit and meeting some characters (I always have to meet Figment), I decided to try some of the food. Sadly, I could not participate in the culinary scavenger hunt, as a few foods on the list were red meat-based, which I could not consume. However, I did try the mozzarella fritta in the Italy-inspired section of the park.
Depending on who you ask, the festival booth at EPCOT’s Italy pavilion has always been a hit or miss. For instance, during last year’s festival, the Italy booth offered “Italian Nachos.” These nachos were fried pasta noodles with beef ragu, tomato sauce and dried ricotta cheese.
Festival goers were not impressed with the Italian offering then, however, I tried the mozzarella fritta and I can safely say that Disney has listened to the fans. The mozzarella fritta is a lump of fresh mozzarella cheese, fried to perfection, served on an adorable plastic artist palette and surrounded by different types of Italian dipping sauces. I tried each sauce myself, and all of the sauces were delicious! To be candid, I did not try the pesto sauce because I don’t care for pesto in general.
Regardless, the mozzarella clump was full of cheese, perfectly breaded and fried. Clearly, it was not a cheap-frozen product. It made me wish Disney would serve fried cheese year-round!
After a very satisfying lunch, I spent the rest of my day participating in smaller festival activities. For example, I watched an artist paint a gorgeous painting of Snow White and watched another artist draw chalk art based on Pixar films. I closed off my EPCOT visit by riding a few of the rides that could be found year-round at the park.
Overall, I really enjoyed myself – the price of admission was absolutely worth the tasty food and experiences to be had at the 2025 EPCOT International Festival of the Arts.
