WHATEVER FLOATS YOUR FLOAT DEDICATION, EXPERTISE, PROBLEM-SOLVING AND LONG (REALLY, REALLY LONG) HOURS MAKE ROLLING ROSE PARADE MIRACLES HAPPEN.

Byline: Valerie Kuklenski Staff Writer

BUILDING A FLOAT for the Tournament of Roses requires creativity, patience, engineering know-how and sincere enthusiasm for the work. And glue by the gallon, welding torches, saws, seeds, farina, seaweed, blenders and laundry mangles.

A tour of a few float barns in Azusa, Pasadena and Burbank in mid-December is a full sensory experience, well before the fresh flowers arrive for application on 50 floats in a six-day frenzy leading up to New Year's Day.

At Festival Artists in Azusa, where construction of floats for Disney's California Adventure park and China Airlines is under way, there are scents of sawdust and hot metal and a damp chill in the air. The intermittent roar of welders' torches and power saws competes with ranchero music.

The float promoting California Adventure's upcoming Twilight Zone Tower of Terror attraction, titled ``A Sudden Drop in Pitch,'' is being assembled in three stages - one with the tower and its plummeting elevator; another with the park's roller coaster, Golden Gate Bridge replica and Ferris wheel; and a lightning bolt for the top that cannot be attached until later - because it is simply too massive for the hangar-size warehouse.

``They wanted the tallest float in the history of the parade,'' Festival owner Craig Bugajski said. So he outdid his 86-foot bungee tower for Nestle in 1993 with a 100-foot tower atop two 55-foot wagons. The float, on this day a partially painted steel and plywood shell, will on parade day have a finished weight of 75,000 pounds and will fold down to 17 feet in height to clear the Sierra Madre overpass.

The Tournament of Roses float business certainly has come a long way from the blossom-festooned carriages of 1890 or even the first spectacular of the floats in 1908. In 1895, the Tournament of Roses Association was formed and was fairly pleased with itself for having raised $595 toward costs of the 1896 parade, now a multimillion-dollar international extravaganza. The first commercial sponsors did not enter floats until 1935, but now they budget years in advance for the expense. Some sponsors already have signed deals for their 2005 floats.

Phoenix Decorating in Pasadena has 23 floats under construction in its Rose Palace building on Raymond Avenue and at the Rose Pavilion just south of the Rose Bowl. Volunteer tour guides walk groups through the Palace, describing the process: The vintage mangle machines are great for flattening dried corn husks, they burn out blenders faster than Jamba Juice by shredding straw flowers and moss in them, pampas grass makes good animal fur, and skin tones on the human figures are made from a combination of sifted farina and corn meal with chili powder or strawberry powder for a little glow.

Bill Lofthouse, owner of Phoenix and now working on his 48th parade, said float budgets can range from $75,000 for a small (35-foot) float with minimal animation to $300,000 for a major effort.

His daughter Michelle's design for Honda, a steam-puffing, cymbal- clanging calliope titled ``Parade Wagon,'' will lead this year's parade, which has the theme ``Music, Music, Music.''

``Honda doesn't sell motorcycles or cars (with a float),'' Bill Lofthouse said. ``Honda just wants the best entry tied to the theme.''

Five or six figures may seem like a huge outlay in a year of high unemployment and corporate belt-tightening, but it's impossible to estimate the value of such feel-good exposure to a million people on the parade sidelines, tens of millions more watching at home and countless others reading about it later in newspapers with full-color photos.

Bugajski described Disney's budget as ``large.'' ``But what it's accomplishing for the parade and for the attraction that is opening up, it's competitively fair,'' he said. ``I think it's good for everybody.''

The Tournament of Roses is the granddaddy of parades for both the float-building profession and the participating sponsors, said Ruth Schnabel, executive director of California and Nevada Festivals and Events Association.

``I think the quality of the Rose Parade is higher than any other event,'' she said, noting that Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York is more of a made-for-television production.

Rose float builders - nearly all of whom worked their ways up from volunteer positions when they were kids - are a cool, composed lot considering the deadline pressures they face. Larry Crain, whose Charisma Floats company is building ``The Three Tenors'' for the city of West Covina and ``Symphony of Service'' for Rotary International, recalls some last-minute glitches of years past.

Ten years ago, there was a shipment of close to 10,000 carnations from Colombia that never arrived because of a transfer error somewhere between the Miami airport and Pasadena. His flower broker found replacements in San Diego. ``Those flowers could still be on a truck somewhere,'' he says with a laugh.

There was the time when high demand for roses in Russia left him without his long-standing order for dark tangerine buds from South America just four days before the parade, and the year that a disease caused chrysanthemum blooms to crumble the moment they were cut from their stems.

``You just have to roll with the punches,'' he said. ``I depend on my floral broker to answer those questions, because at that point I have no time. It's, like, react and move and go on.''

The City of Burbank entry, a $65,000 salute to singing cowboys titled ``Moosic, Moosic, Moosic,'' is a simpler endeavor than the big corporate efforts, but its all-volunteer design and construction team is no less familiar with complications and the last-minute hustle.

TaMara Carlson-Woodard, who co-designed the Burbank float with Jennifer Edward and is supervising its decorating, said the float gained 900 square feet from design to execution, which means stretching their floral materials or making some changes.

``We have a means to work within, and we have to somehow make it happen,'' she said. ``We're definitely going to make it, but personally it's driving me bonkers.''

Janet Diel, the liaison between Burbank officials and the Tournament of Roses Association, admits it seems a little crazy to work so hard year after year, getting so excited while having glue in your hair, seeds down your back and petals under your nails.

``My whole family's done this for 16 years, working all hours and then sleeping in the back of the station wagon because there was so much to do and not enough time to go home,'' she said. ``It is a bunch of crazy people proud of putting together something to represent our city to the world. There is a great sense of accomplishment: This is my city, my float, my part that I worked on.''

Valerie Kuklenski, [phone]

valerie.kuklenski(at)dailynews.com

2004 TOURNAMENT OF ROSES

Where: CBS (Channel 2), NBC (Channel 4), KTLA (Channel 5), ABC (Channel 7), HGTV.

When: 8 a.m. New Year's Day. (KTLA replays its coverage at 10:30 a.m. and 1 p.m.)

IF YOU GO

If you never have attended the Tournament of Roses, maybe this is the year. Grandstand seats are on sale for $40 to $85 through Sharp Seating (www.sharpseating.com or [phone]) or Ticketmaster (www.ticketmaster.com or [phone]). The best free curbside seats will be staked out about 24 hours before the parade rolls at 8 a.m. New Year's Day. Bring your own lawn chairs, bedrolls, confetti and beverages for toasting at midnight. The route begins on Orange Grove Boulevard at Ellis Street, runs north to Colorado Boulevard, follows it east to Sierra Madre Boulevard, then north to Villa Street.

CAPTION(S):

10 photos, 2 boxes, map

Photo:

(1 -- cover -- color) ON THE COVER: Workers place scaffolding around the City of West Covina float at Charisma Float Designs near the Rose Bowl.

(2 -- color) Esmeralda Pereyra paints pieces of a float as Disney's California Adventure float looms in the background at Festival Artists in Azusa.

(3 -- color) A bear waits to be placed on the Rotary International float as Abraham Valdez of Charisma Float Designs works in the background.

(4 -- color) Phoenix's Cross finds a precarious perch while working on the Northern Mariana Islands' ``Harmony of the Pacific'' float.

(5 -- color) Jonathan Cross uses his own wind power on ``The Lutheran Hour's'' entry, ``Make Music to the Lord,'' at Phoenix Decorating in Pasadena.

(6 -- color) Burt Ballard works on Burbank's ``Moosic Moosic Moosic.''

(7) Paint brings a flower to life on the West Covina float.

(8) Norberto Tellez welds a head for China Air's float.

(9) Beans add texture to this fish for Long Beach's entry.

(10) Festival Artists' Miguel Alzaraz gives shape to a face.

Hans Gutknecht/Staff Photographer

Box:

(1) IF YOU GO (see text)

(2) POST-PARADE FLOAT VIEWING

Map:

Float viewing area