March 24 has been revealed as the date on which Pavillion 2 at the Expo Tel Aviv will be handed over for Eurovision 2019 preparations to begin.

Speaking to The Jerusalem Post Iris Mazel, the vice president of sales and marketing at Expo Tel Aviv explained how preparations for next years Eurovision Song Contest are well underway. On March 24 Pavilion 2 will be handed over to KAN and the Production team before pavilions 1 and then 11, 12, 13 and 14 are handed over from the end of April.

According to The Jerusalem Post, Pavilion 1 is likely to contain the Green Room, which will host of participants after they have performed on stage. Pavilion 1 will be linked to Pavilion 2 by a tunnel which is to be contruscted for the contest, this will mean the the participants do not have to go outside to access to the two spaces. The remaining Pavilions will be used as the Press Centre, production spaces and other necessary activities.

Iris Mazel went on to explain that the Expo has had to work with events that were previously planned for the time period of the Eurovision Song Contest. The Expo has never been closed off from other events for such a substantial period of time. The previously planned events have been moved to early March or pushed back to June.

Of note is that the entire Expo space will become a home for Eurovision and its fans. There are currently plans to use the space around the Expo for fans that have not been able to get tickets to the show. There will also be welcome cocktails on an open-air deck that can host more than a thousand people.

The EBU has visited the venue alongside KAN a number of times since Tel Aviv was selected as the host city. The Expo’s staff have also been among a delegation that traveled to Stockholm, to understand how they hosted the contest in 2016.

Tel Aviv will host the Eurovision Song Contest 2019 in the Expo Tel Aviv (International Convention Centre) on May 14, 16 and 18 2019. Tickets for the contest will be available by the end of the year. While Tel Aviv has never hosted the Eurovision Song Contest, the “Israel Calling” Party has been held in the city since 2016. Acts from 25 participating countries took part in this year’s event.

Source: The Jerusalem Post