Charles Meier pulled his first all nighter when he was 11 years old. His mother found him asleep in a flower box.
It was the night before final judging for the 1990 Rose Parade. Meier, a volunteer, had been running around for hours helping float decorators fill vials of water, scrape seeds and glue last-minute details. Exhausted, he finally crawled into a box that still smelled of orchids.
His parents snapped a picture, not knowing that their son would go on to win South Pasadena's float design contest just two years later, making him the youngest designer in Rose Parade history.
Nor did they imagine he would one day break through a tight-knit institution and start his own float company. When the 124th Rose Parade rolls out Tuesday, Meier's company will be the event's first new professional builder in almost two decades.
"I basically traded in stuffed animals for Rose Parade floats," said Meier, 34. "Other kids were at home reading comic books, and I'm here organizing my float pictures into photo albums. It was what captured my imagination."
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Meier still remembers the moment he fell in love.
He was 9 years old, sitting in grandstand seats his parents had won in a raffle. It was sensory overload: Booming marching bands. Floats adorned with tractors and dancers on a giant piano. And color. So much color.
He started drawing floats that day. He studied flowers, memorized parade brochures and, accompanied by his parents, joined float decorating committees. He couldn't stop talking about his ideas.
"I don't want to hear you describe another float," his mother, Carol, told him. "Just draw one and send it in and see if they will build it."
Every year, he submitted designs to his hometown float committee. On his 13th birthday, South Pasadena selected his drawing. Instead of letting the experts take over, he insisted on working with the graphic designer on his vision of two aliens playing tug-of-war with a spaceship.
"It was really kind of funny. He was so young. I mean, he was 13, just a kid," said Dex Regatz, 82, the graphic designer who took Meier under his wing.
"Before they knew it, I had insisted I do the complete floral plan," Meier said. "And they actually took most of those ideas and ran with them."
He quickly became a live encyclopedia of flowers and colors.
He once exercised his mental floral database by designing a Valentine-themed float with 94 types of roses, an unmatched feat in Rose Parade annals. He juggled hot pink Hot Ladys, bicolored Panamas and King Kongs with hints of green.
He experiences his life through the prism of floats. Walking across moss inspired the furry texture for an animal. Coconut flakes, so white he thought they sparkled, looked perfect for celestial stars and eyeballs.
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To pay his bills, Meier worked as a senior caretaker and freelance floral designer.
But on the side, he continued to volunteer for South Pasadena and Sierra Madre. He won fans with his enthusiasm, many said, and he treated each float as an intricate work of art.
"I'm always so impressed with his floats. You can stand anywhere, from any angle, and it looks good," said Gwen Robertson, a longtime Sierra Madre volunteer.
