As Sleeping Beauty Castle finally loses its Mickey's Magical Party makeover (yes, it's really gone!), we look ahead to what New Gen decorations may await... only to see some rather tasteful, not oversized nor identical, lamppost designs...,
And the real shocker is, they’re not for the lampposts you might be thinking of.
Yes, unbelievably, these stills from a backstage video looking at the New Generation Festival, beginning 2nd April, show small character placards attached to the regular, human-sized Main Street gas lanterns.
Both classic and ‘New Generation’ characters are shown within an ornate frame, integrated into the lamppost with a colourful ribbon, in yellow, green, pink and purple, leading down to a gold ring.
This style of decoration, actually integrating things into the original park rather than throwing them on top, is often used at the American and Japanese Disney resorts. Disneyland in California and Florida’s Magic Kingdom in particular have recently had several different styles of gas lantern decorations for their continuous Dreams/Celebrate campaigns.
The only bad thing, perhaps, is that the concept images laid out on the table here also show a rather large New Generation Festival covering on Main Street Station. Well, old habits die hard.
For the past 3 years, we’ve never seen Main Street without those oversized white lampposts which held giant 15th Anniversary banners. Originally designed as LED-lit “chandeliers” for the Christmas season, they were modified for the birthday events in 2007 and have stuck on ever since.
Since Main Street is designed using forced perspective tricks, where successive storeys of buildings are sized smaller, these oversized banner poles look completely out of place with the quaint world around them, reaching as high as the street’s (fake) third story with the banners bigger than doorways.
After all 26 towering poles were given identical Mickey’s Magical Party banners in March last year, there was suddenly an overnight cull as all but 8 were removed, opening up Main Street. If the rather more subtle decorations in these screenshots make it to the final cut, the giant white lampposts should be gone for good, if they aren’t already…
There’s been no time wasted in removing the decorations from Sleeping Beauty Castle this week as Mickey’s Magical Party came to an end. Twitter and magicforum user ElenaSearle posted two pictures a lot of people have waited months (or perhaps, with the 15th decorations, years) to see. The first, posted yesterday, shows the main ‘MMP’ emblem removed:
Whilst the second shows the remainder of the twisted Mickey-shaped spires removed and replaced with the gold leaf originals:
If there’s one good thing to come of this, it’s that we’re reminded all over again just how beautiful this castle really is. Now all that remains is for oversized Tinkerbell fly, fly away, as well…
Video stills © Disney. Photos by ElenaSearle. With thanks to magicforum, Photos Magiques.
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Comments
Sleeping Beauty Castle returns!
Ah. Well. Indeed the normal castle without these strange ears of mickey are back. Fine.
Tinkerbell is a nice addition to the castle.
I wonder what it’s like working on these changes in the middle of the night.
spero che non mettano altre decorazioni sul castello e lo lascino respirare un po’.. è molto meglio senza nulla secondo me..
I completely agree, as a long time follower for the parks, stuff like this is what makes Disney great, great architecture meets great design and technology, not garishly slapping on Disney branded objects at every nook and cranny of the park. On the whole i’m pleased as it was a disrupted icon.
Wow, so glad to see the Castle back to its previous glory! Exactly as it should be, with no tacky gimmicks. I still shudder at the memory of the castle during the Hunchback of Notre Dame season many years ago.
I don’t really mind the lamp posts, as long as the banners are tasteful, and not too garish. The new designs look lovely.
Thanks for the info and photos.
Thank God! That’s all I have to say about this.
I like the tinkerbell :) she’s a nice wee addition to the already beautiful castle x
CL and Jen, Tinkerbell has been there for a while now- she’s not new.
Lovely castle pics! The clear blue sky is a fantastic backdrop.
Great news, both for the castle and Main Street! Now let’s hope they remove Tinkerbell and add back the top of the plant that looks like it’s growing up the side of the castle.
I know some people like Tinkerbell, but she’s a Peter Pan character and she already exists on top of the nearby Disneyland Hotel. Let’s keep the castle in its original state, which was a beautiful, coherent tribute to Disney’s Sleeping Beauty.
I wish they would also let Main Street be Main Street and stay away from modern posters (depicting Disney characters or promoting the current celebration), as I think they ruin the turn-of-the-century atmosphere that the Street is supposed to create.
The removal of the oversized lampposts is a great first step though!
Its about time, nice to see tink and not those ears