For Ted Viator, life is a ball. It’s immaculate landscaping, glistening Mardi Gras costumes, towering centerpieces, tap dancing and events that go off without a hitch. Viator believes all of this can be traced back to his roots, however juxtaposed they may seem, of growing up as the youngest of three sons on a dairy farm.

“Farming just wasn’t my thing. I found that everything would always break with me; lots of tractor wrecks,” he laughs. “But growing up on a farm is where I got my interest in gardening and horticulture. I was very fortunate that our parents let each of us develop our own personalities. As a young boy, my mother would take me to garden club meetings, because that’s what I was interested in.”

In Junior High, Viator was researching careers for a paper when the words “landscape architect” jumped off of the page. That was where his career path began. Viator lost his father soon after he graduate high school, because of this, he vowed to stay near his mother and enrolled in UL. The school’s lack of a landscaping department led Viator to make the difficult decision to obtain a degree from LSU.

“After I graduated, I moved back home and got a job at Lafayette Nursery, and I fell in love with it,” he recalls. “It was so exciting to see a design, something you dreamed up, become real life. I started in the nursery and became head of the department. I also started to work with them on decorating for Christmas events, weddings and parties. After five years, I decided to go out on my own.”

Viator’s experience with Lafayette Nursery laid the seeds for many future endeavors, like the founding of Viator & Associates, Inc. Landscape Architects. However, it also gave him a deep-rooted love and talent for producing large-scale events, the more over the top…the better. When the Mystic Krewe of Apollo de Lafayette asked him to design their set, he set to the task the same way he would a landscape project.

“The scenery and costume design, it came easy to me because of my work with landscaping,” he reasons. “It’s all the same design principle. You just look at the stage as a quick design that will only last for one night. The design principles just change and mature.”

Viator was soon asked to be the King of Apollo, which led to a 20-year run as captain of the krewe. He also works with the krewes Bonaparte and Attakapas. Mardi Gras is as much a part of Viator as is his eye color. He views the fabulous fete much like Cinderella’s ball. When it’s over, everything returns to normal.

“My favorite thing with Mardi Gras is that it’s all make believe,” he beams. “You can take a person who is very shy, put them in a costume and they become another person. It’s there one time to go on stage in front of thousands of people and do something they would never do day to day. I tell that to Kings and Queens, ‘You’re not real royalty. Tomorrow you will be back to yourself.’”

For his 60^th birthday, Viator decided to throw his very own ball. After losing his mother to Alzheimer’s and watching his brother begin to succumb to the disease as well, Viator decided that his birthday party would serve as a fundraiser for the Alzheimer’s Association. He brought together every facet of his life for the event, which raised over $100,000. Viator still reflects on the evening as the best night of his life.

One of the groups representing Viator’s life at the event was the legendary Sugar Lumps. As a young boy, Viator recalls sitting in school full of excitement that as soon as the bell rang, he would be on his way to Lester Mae’s School of Dance. Some 30 years, later when Viator reunited with all of the girls he spent so many years dancing with, they all decided that it was time to revive the group. Today, they regularly get together to practice and perform. 

From landscaping to tap dancing and every extravagant event in between, Viator can’t point to one single moment that shaped his life – he points to each of them.

“Everything has played a little part. Working with people to create these beautiful spaces and moment, it’s what I love to do. My whole life has been one big ball.”