On 25 October 2026 two living orchids gave a concert at the Estepona Botanical Park and Orchidarium. It was the premiere of “Listening to the Invisible”, the Sinfonía Biótica installation that is now a permanent part of the Orchidarium. What happened next in the media is worth telling too, because it proves something we care about: a well-told art-and-nature project can reach millions of people.
We gathered all the coverage we could verify, from 21 October to 11 November 2026, and turned it into data.
The data at a glance
18
news stories and pieces
15
media outlets
2
news agencies: EFE and Europa Press
1
national TV news bulletin (TVE La 1)
10,686
measured impressions on X (17 posts)
2.49M
combined followers of the X accounts that posted it
1.5–2.1M
estimated total impressions*
* Estimate. The methodology note at the end of this article explains how we calculated it.
From announcement to the evening news: how the story grew
21–22 October: the announcement. A press release from Estepona City Council started the conversation. Within 48 hours Europa Press Andalucía, Diario Sur, La Opinión de Málaga and ABC had picked it up, and Radio Estepona interviewed the Orchidarium’s curator, Manuel Lucas.
25–26 October: the concert. The EFE news agency covered the premiere with text and video. Its post on X alone reached 8,803 impressions, and the story was republished by Infobae, MSN and Lado.mx (Mexico). Planomato, 8atodacosta and Ecoticias rounded out the online coverage.
28 October – 3 November: going national. El Mundo ran a feature in its Science section, La Gaceta de Salamanca published an interview with Fernando Fernández, and TVE’s La 1 evening news (Telediario) aired the piece “Orchids to make music”.
- Reach: local (Estepona), regional (Málaga and Andalusia), national (El Mundo, ABC, RTVE) and international (Infobae, Lado.mx).
- Formats: print and online press, news agencies, radio, TV and social media.
- Message: almost every headline carried the same idea, “Spain’s first orchid concert”.
- Audience: more than a hundred people filled the Orchidarium for the premiere.
Full coverage
Social media: what we can actually measure
On X we found 17 original posts about the premiere, from EFE, La Opinión de Málaga, Ecoticias, Europa Press Málaga, Estepona City Council, its Culture Department, the mayor, Radio Estepona and the Orchidarium itself, among others, plus 9 reposts of EFE’s video. Together they add up to 10,686 real impressions, according to X’s public data as of 11 November 2026. The accounts that posted it have around 2.49 million followers between them, mostly EFE’s.
It was also shared on Instagram (Estepona City Council and MolinoLab), but those figures aren’t public and we haven’t counted them.
Methodology note
We separate measured data from estimates:
- Measured: X impressions and followers, taken from X’s public API on 11/11/2026. We only count posts about the concert or the installation.
- TV (estimate): according to Barlovento Comunicación (9 and 10 November 2026), TVE La 1’s Telediario bulletins draw an average of 1.50 to 1.95 million viewers. We use that range as the piece’s likely reach, although we don’t have the minute-by-minute audience figure.
- Online press (estimate): outlets don’t publish per-article readership, so we apply conservative ranges per story. National or international outlets (El Mundo, ABC, Infobae, MSN): 5,000 to 30,000. Regional (Diario Sur, La Opinión de Málaga): 2,000 to 10,000. Europa Press: 1,000 to 5,000. Local or specialist (Planomato, 8atodacosta, Ecoticias, Lado.mx, La Gaceta de Salamanca, Radio Estepona): 300 to 3,000. Institutional websites: 200 to 2,000. In total that comes to 27,000 to 169,000 reads.
- Total: TV, online press and X add up to an estimated 1.5 to 2.1 million impressions. Leaving out TV, the total is 38,000 to 180,000.
- We left out outlets that only announced the fair without mentioning the installation, and the Orchidarium magazine.
What if the next story is your garden?
There was no big paid campaign behind these numbers. There was a good story, told on time and in plain words, with photos and video ready for the press, and close coordination with the Orchidarium’s and the City Council’s communication teams.
We now offer this as a service to botanical gardens, national and natural parks, and any institution that works with plants. It covers press releases, media relations, audiovisual material and social media outreach, so your event can travel as far as Estepona’s did.
— b1tdreamer (Fernando Fernández), Sinfonía Biótica
