Flower Duet Decorates a Rose Parade Float

by Casey Schwartz

Casey with our broth­er, Stu, on the LMU float just under “Iggy” the LMU mascot.

Our old­er broth­er, Stu Cole­man, just wrapped up his expe­dit­ed com­ple­tion of his MBA at Loy­ola Mary­mount Uni­ver­si­ty (LMU) here in Los Ange­les. To cel­e­brate their cen­ten­ni­al, LMU was enter­ing a float for the very first time in the his­to­ry of the Rose Parade. LMU post­ed they were look­ing for vol­un­teers to help dec­o­rate the float, so Stu signed us up.

History of Float Decorating Runs Strong

In high school, I host­ed the home­com­ing float build­ing at our house my Junior and Senior year and Kit host­ed the float dec­o­ra­tion at our house her Sopho­more year at McLean High School in McLean, VA (we are five years apart in age, but attend­ed the same high school). We had a design and plan. We did the fram­ing and chick­en wire, and the cov­ered it with lit­tle cut-out squares of tis­sue paper — not flowers!
All our lives, we can remem­ber our Mom (a native of Los Ange­les) would be sure we were awake to watch the Rose Parade on New Year’s Day Morn­ing (not a hard feat when you live on the East Coast). The vivid col­ors, the detail and real­i­ty that every­thing was cov­ered with flow­ers — and not tis­sue were all hard to fath­om. We always won­dered, “How do they do that?” and I was delight­ed that I was able to find out this past week as a gen­uine Rose Parade Float decorator.

Job Assignments

We arrived at the Pasade­na Rose Palace where Phoenix Dec­o­rat­ing is based a bit before 8 a.m. for our eight-hour shift. We got the brief­ing from the crew chief that we were going to be assigned jobs from cut­ting to glu­ing. If we were okay with heights, we might have to work on scaf­fold­ing. Stu’s shift the day before had been as a vol­un­teer crew­man where he spent the day aloft at 80 feet above deck on the Tall Ship Lady Wash­ing­ton, so heights were not an issue. There were over 30 vol­un­teers for just the LMU float, and many oth­er groups report­ing in for oth­er floats. Once we entered inside the Rose Palace, I was sur­prised to see about 8–10 floats all side by side, in var­i­ous stages of com­ple­tion. It was an amaz­ing site. Vol­un­teers who had gone in ahead of us were already cut­ting Sta­t­ice flow­ers. Kit and I use this flower often, as it is a great filler and dries very well which is per­fect for floats! Stu and I and anoth­er sib­ling set were cho­sen to climb up the float and do our best to fin­ish the LMU mas­cot, Iggy the Lion. I thought, “Wow — what an honor.”

Color By Numbers

Stu works on Iggy.

All parts of the floats have been col­or cod­ed in order to fill in with the prop­er medi­um. They are basi­cal­ly a giant 3D “col­or by num­ber,” but instead of paint, you fill in the spaces with flow­ers or seed or moss.

Not Too Fluffy…

Casey applies the Pam­pas Grass.

The four of us were tasked with fill­ing in where it was cream col­ored cod­ed with very small plumes of Pam­pas Grass. Those huge bil­low­ing beige tufts you see close to the beach shoot­ing out of green grass­es, scaled down to just a pinkies worth had to be laid down in the same direc­tion atop a flo­ral glue called Oasis Glue. We were instruct­ed to make it, “Not too fluffy, matt it down with your hands.”

How to Apply Seeds to a Float

Casey demostrates the glue-sponge-cap­ture excess tech­nique for apply­ing seeds and cut-up flower petals.

We got to work and it was real­ly cool. We got a rhythm going and wrapped up pret­ty quick­ly, most of the body and face were done so we moved next to the feet and the four of us each took a paw. On the paws, we used Clover seed, Orange Straw Flower and more Pam­pas for the tops of the feet. We used plain old white glue to apply the seeds and straw flow­ers and it was a pret­ty basic, but effec­tive tech­nique. We brushed on the glue with a sim­ple wood­en han­dled nar­row paint brush over the area to cov­er, then scooped up a pile of seeds or flow­ers on half a dry kitchen sponge, then pressed it against the area that we just glued. The excess drops into the box that you need to hold under­neath the area you are cov­er­ing. It was all a bit messy, but once you get the hang of it, the cov­er­age is fast and effi­cient and real­ly fun. The feet were just about done and we took a break for lunch, which LMU supplied.

Approval of a Job Well Done!

View of the oth­er floats from our perch near Iggy.

Stu and I returned to fin­ish up Iggy alone, as the oth­er sib­lings had left, and every­one seemed to be hap­py with their jobs. We looked for areas that need­ed more cov­er­age, fin­ished the tail, and touched up all over and were approved that Iggy was done! Next, we vac­u­umed under Iggy to pick up all the Pam­pas, Clover and Straw Flow­ers that had missed the box.

I Spy…

Below us they were adding a ton of Sta­t­ice for the win­dows and across from us.

Across from us, four ladies were apply­ing two lay­ers of rice to give the look of stuc­co for the LMU cam­pus build­ing and bell tow­er. It was amaz­ing­ly effective.

At left: Ming Moss in a buck­et wait­ing to be applied to a float to become the “skin for an elephant.”

As we were close to end­ing our shift, we were not assigned anoth­er job. So we decid­ed to walk around and see what was going on with the oth­er floats. I felt a lit­tle like a spy. We walked by about eight peo­ple break­ing out Ming Moss from its woody stems, then strain­ing it through a grate to sep­a­rate it fur­ther. It was to become the skin of an elephant.

Next we came upon a few vol­un­teers apply­ing pop­py seeds to mark­ings on a dinosaur, then we turned the cor­ner to see over a dozen peo­ple apply­ing pinky/orange lentils to the mid­dle of daisy-like flow­ers. The tiny lentils had to be applied one at a time in a mosa­ic pat­tern. We saw buck­ets of onion seed, pop­py seed, Sta­t­ice of all col­ors, let­tuce seeds, pars­ley and tons of clover seed which is mus­tard colored.

At left: Straw Flowers.

Every­one was work­ing hard, some qui­et­ly, some chat­ting with fam­i­ly or groups that had come togeth­er and some in polite con­ver­sa­tion as they most like­ly just met. All the while, each vol­un­teer was work­ing steadi­ly as was expect­ed and nec­es­sary. Every job is need­ed and impor­tant and part of the process in this amaz­ing annu­al event.

Before, During and After…

In 2009: Casey with her two sons, Will on the left and Sam on the right, in 2009 at the view­ing of the floats after the parade.

Kit, Mom and I were for­tu­nate to buy tick­ets for the Rose Parade many years ago and made the trek up to Pasade­na to sit in the bleach­ers in the cold New Year’s morn­ing to watch the floats, hors­es and amaz­ing march­ing bands go by in per­son. Kit and I have tak­en my two boys to see the floats the day after the parade to see and smell them. Now, I can add to my list that I’ve seen, touched and climbed on the floats before they are ful­ly dressed and ready for their close-up. It is a great event, known world­wide and I would vol­un­teer to dec­o­rate a float again for sure. I am grate­ful to my broth­er, Stu, for the oppor­tu­ni­ty and so hap­py to be part of his MBA com­ple­tion celebration!

Parade is on January 2nd for 2012

The 123rd Rose Parade pre­sent­ed by Hon­da themed “Just Imag­ine…” will take place on Mon­day, Jan­u­ary 2, 2012 at 8:00 a.m. (PST) fea­tur­ing spir­it­ed march­ing bands from through­out the nation, majes­tic flo­ral floats, and high-step­ping eques­tri­an units. In 1893, offi­cials decid­ed it would be best to avoid inter­fer­ing with Sun­day wor­ship ser­vices and decid­ed to move events to Jan­u­ary 2nd when­ev­er Jan­u­ary 1st fell on a Sun­day. The last time the “Nev­er on a Sun­day” pol­i­cy was in effect was in 2006.

See the Floats Up Close After the Parade

For a small admis­sion fee, you can see and smell the floats after the parade on Jan­u­ary 2nd and 3rd. Find out more details on Post Rose Parade Float Viewing.

Flower Duet Featured as Cover Story in The Bloomin’ News

Final­ly, Casey and I can say we are “cov­er girls.” Not only that, but we can say we are the fea­ture sto­ry in this mon­th’s edi­tion of Bloomin’ News magazine!

About Bloomin’ News

Bloomin’ News is pub­lished by the Amer­i­can Florists’ Exchange / Los Ange­les Flower Mar­ket and was start­ed in Octo­ber 1949 by the South­ern Cal­i­for­nia Flo­ral Asso­ci­a­tion, which oper­at­ed the two major whole­sale flower mar­kets that, along with store­front ven­dors, today com­prise the Los Ange­les Flower Dis­trict in the 700 block of Wall Street in Los Ange­les. This mag­a­zine serves a var­ied audi­ence of retail florists, design­ers, event and wed­ding plan­ners, whole­salers, grow­ers, ven­dors and LA Flower Mar­ket ten­ants. It helps them to stay in touch with each oth­er and learn about events and news of the flo­ral indus­try local­ly and nationally.

Studio Visit

In Octo­ber of 2011, Bloomin’ News edi­tor, Peg­gi Ridg­way, came to our design stu­dio in Tor­rance, Calif. to inter­view us, take some pho­tos and have a tour of our offices and design space. It was a great expe­ri­ence to re-trace our steps and talk about how Flower Duet sprout­ed up in the late 1990s. It remind­ed me of how far we’ve come with the busi­ness and how won­der­ful it is to be part­ners with my sister.

Learn How Flower Duet Got Started

You can read the arti­cle, too! Down­load the arti­cle or vis­it the Bloomin’ News web­site to learn more about A Won­der­ful Duet: Casey Schwartz and Kit Wertz of Flower Duet by Peg­gi Ridgway.

FREE Video: HowTo Make a Quick and Easy Flower Design

Flower Duet Adds More Videos to its YouTube Channel

We con­tin­ue to add more free videos to our YouTube chan­nel. Casey appeared on behalf of Flower Duet for the 2010 and 2011 sea­son of Cre­ative Liv­ing, which airs on PBS sta­tions across the coun­try. We are able to air these seg­ments with the per­mis­sion of Cre­ative Liv­ing via our chan­nel on YouTube!

This mon­th’s video is called Gath­er, Drop and Fill. In less than ten min­utes, you can learn how to arrange flow­ers into a low vase and have it look like you spent hours doing it!

Sub­scribe to our YouTube chan­nel: fash­ion­ingflow­ers so you’ll know when we’ve uploaded a new show!

Book Review

Bouquets for Brides by René van Rems

Kit had the plea­sure of attend­ing a Christ­mas Flower Work­shop with René van Rems down in Vista, Calif. at the begin­ning of Decem­ber. Flower Duet feels it’s impor­tant to keep learn­ing new tech­niques from top flo­ral design­ers and René is one of the best and so close to our home base. While Kit was there, she picked up a few books for our design library. If you are work­ing on wed­dings, then you must get the new Rene’s Bou­quets for Brides book. The cov­er tells you a lot about what type of qual­i­ty ideas and inspi­ra­tion you’ll get inside.

You’ll find 25 chap­ters of large pho­tos, close-up images and some “how-to” visu­als to show­case the var­i­ous bou­quet styles.

From René’s site: “This book is for brides, design­ers, bridal con­sul­tants, spe­cial event design­ers and oth­ers who want to be unique and dif­fer­ent, yet in real-time taste and style.”

Floral Design Tool: Roost Flower Frogs

Roost Architectural Flower Frogs:

Get a lit­tle help design­ing flow­ers and an arty boost to the under­wa­ter vase look with these mod­ern flower frogs from Roost. These designs are made from heavy iron and plat­ed with zinc to help pre­vent rust. These stur­dy pieces are designed to work with heavy glass vas­es. Roost sells the vas­es sep­a­rate­ly, but I would just order these and then see if you have any vas­es that might work first. You can also use these in an opaque vase as an eco-friend­ly option to flo­ral foam.

Each Flo­ral Frog’s Dimensions:

Low Totem: 4 1/4″ dia x 9″ H

Tall Totem: 5″ dia x 12 3/4″ H

Truss: 5 1/4″ dia x 8 1/2″ H

Cir­cle Grid: 10″ dia x 3 1/4″ H

Square Small: 4 1/4″ sq x 4″ H

Square Large: 8″ sq x 5″ H

BONUS: These can be ordered through velocityartanddesign.com and all Roost prod­ucts are on sale for 15% off through Jan­u­ary 16, 2012.