Mardi Gras World NOLA

Steve and I had visited Mardi Gras World NOLA on our very first trip to the Crescent City in March of 1991.

We had gone to NOLA for a catering conference and the tour was one of the planned events. Three things really stand out in my memory. The first was that we took a ferry to the location in Algiers, on the West Bank. The second was the incredible whole hog roast which was so tender, succulent and delicious, I knew I’d be searching for that flavor for years to come. And the third was my very first experience with crawfish.

But I can’t really say I remember much about the Mardi Gras floats from that first visit. So I was thrilled when the Project Manager offered me tickets for a tour of the new Mardi Gras World NOLA in exchange for writing this article.

Mardi Gras World moved to this new 300,000 square foot  location in 2008. The Algiers location was considerably smaller at 80,000 square feet. I can attest to the fact that they need every inch of their larger accommodations.

Mardi Gras World has come a long way from its humble beginning, with a history that dates all the way back to 1932. That’s when the first mule drawn float was built by Roy and his son Blaine, on the back of a garbage wagon. It started with Roy Kern, a local artist who turned to sign painting during the Depression, and earned a living by painting names and signs on the bows of freighters and barges. However because he was not able to pay for his mother’s medical bills, he offered to paint a mural in the hospital as payment.

Fourteen years later, Blaine Kern Sr., Roy’s son, founded Blaine Kern Artists. He’d come from a family of float builders. Blaine began creating floats after 1947. It was spurred by a surgeon, who was a krewe captain, saw the mural that Kern had painted in the hospital. So he hired him to create floats for the Krewe of Alla. The business grew from there. This is truly where Mardi Gras is made!

Kern traveled to Europe to learn all he could about float building methods and has since gained an international reputation as a float builder. His floats travel well beyond New Orleans to Las Vegas NV, Mobile AL, Galveston TX, Montreal ON Canada and to the Universal Studios Mardi Gras Parade. The business grew as one float, led to another. It wasn’t long before Blaine became NOLA’s leading parade designer and builder, adding Krewes like Rex, Zulu and so on.

Today’s floats are based on the ideas learned in the European travels. The floats have grown to a monumental scale with lavish ornamentation. Blaine Kern’s artistry and technical ability was key in those “formative year of  some of New Orleans’ biggest parades and ‘Super Krewes” and is still known as Mr. Mardi Gras.