DISNEYLAND ARCHITECTURE

One of the things I do at Disneyland is look for ideas I can adapt to my own house. I could easily spend a profitable day just looking at the ironwork on fences or the doorknobs on dungeon doors. I was there this weekend but my camera was on the fritz and I didn't get too many useful photos. That's okay. I'll supplement my own pictures with ones from the net.

Here they are. See what you think.

Here's (above) the Small World facade, beautifully designed by Mary Blair. Geez, with foam core and an exacto I could make a miniature facade of my own design for....no, wait a minute. That would probably be more trouble than it looks.

Above, nice vintage explorer photos in the Indiana Jones ride.

Old explorer photos would be great additions for the wall of a boys room...or a guest room that looks like a boys room. Add to this Bill Peet layout a nice map and maybe a fish tank and a Navajo rug...Wow, it would be a kid Paradise.

Here's some interesting lamps from Disneyland's Mexican restaurant. I wonder if this type of lamp would work in my house? I'm not sure.

And talking about lamps, how do you like these rice paper lanterns over the Teacup ride? I notice that blue dominates, red and purple are secondary and yellow is only an accent.   If I ever throw a party in my back yard I'll know what to reference.

Here's (above) how architect Cliff May designed a room for a client who had a paper lamp collection. He made the walls brown so the yellow lamps would read better.

I get a million ideas for garage rafters (above) at Disneyland.

And all the Alpine ideas at the Park! They're endless!

Haw! I'd like to embellish my back fence with artifacts like these (above), from Adventureland. I wonder what my neighbors would say?

DISNEYLAND...AGAIN?

Yep...again! I have a friend who has an employee's Silver Pass and when he calls, I'm always up for it. Anyway, this time we decided to concentrate on Frontierland. The land is so big that even with an entire day to spend there we had to pass up a lot.

The first thing to do in Frontierland is to take a ride on the paddle-wheel steamship. The whole boat is a work of art.

Past the heavy traffic area the river is surprisingly intimate and quiet. Surprisingly authentic, too. You'd swear you were in the backwoods of Tennessee or Missouri. The landscapers did such a good job that when you come across examples of human habitation like an Indian village they seem a little jarring and out of place.

As the ship approaches civilization again we begin to see artifacts of human habitation: Narrow gauge railroad tracks (above) and a pier. The tracks are decorative but they'd work great for a small, real-world, suburban railroad.

After the steamboat ride we headed for the canoes. This simple ride is one of the most fun things you can do in Frontierland.

Those X%&*@ two cute little girls behind me shoveled at least a gallon of water down my back.

A duck family paddled almost right up to the boat. They seemed to have had no fear of humans.

A quick peek (above) into the nearby Golden Horseshoe Saloon. Wow! Imagine how great it would be to have a local dinner theatre like this!

Next stop: the magesterial Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. If you visit Disneyland don't pass this up. In photos it looks like other theme-related small rollercoasters you've seen and you figure you can safely pass it up.  N-O-T   T-R-U-E!!!!!!! The ride is absolutely unique and is not to be missed...even if you have to stand in line with crying children for an hour to ride it.

The ride should really be in Tomorrowland. It's the urban transportation of the future, not the past. Ride it and you'll glimpse the dazzling world of 2040 when the concept of a City of the Young will hopefully have taken hold.

What the ride has to offer isn't visible in pictures, it isn't even visible to people in the park who watch it without riding it. It's the Art of Experience which may turn out to be the primary artform of this emerging century. The ride combines motion with carefully controlled 3D spatial awareness and sound. You'll have to ride it to know what I'm talking about. It incorporates advances in psychology as well as engineering. I'd like to know the name of the genius who thought of this.

DISNEYLAND ARCHITECTURE [EXPANDED]

Yep, I had another weekend trip to Disneyland! I wish I could have spent the day taking pictures of the interesting people that the park attracts, but I didn't know how to do that without coming home with a black eye, so I photographed architecture instead. See what you think!

I like the idea of giving a high-ceiling room a display gallery like this (above) one. The lower tier of the gallery contains tracks for a model railroad. 

I love complex wooden ceiling/roof structures (above) like the kind you see in Fantasyland.

Here's (above) Minnie's House in Toontown. It's a craftsman bungalow modified to be wonky and super cozy. That 30s/40s look works great. 

The leaf pattern on the sofa works with the green walls.

Opposite the sofa (above) is the fireplace and an intriguing grotto with steps leading to an imaginary second floor.

Next door is Mickey's house (above) and that has a somewhat different fireplace.

Mickey's kitchen lets out into a small sun porch. Here its used as a potting shed or a greenhouse. With screens instead of glass it might be a breakfast room or even a sleeping porch.

I like the storage area (above) in Mickey's house. Those green columns look great! Stained wood is the way to go, but stains need to be repainted every six years or so.

Disneyland is full of ideas that you can adapt to your own real-world situation. I like the idea of having contrasting shapes and thick shelves on the wall.

Borrowing an idea from Adventureland, you could hang things from the ceiling in nets.

Nice banisters, but what are they made of? It looks like a combination of plastic and concrete, but I'm probably wrong. 

Wow! A nice car design! I wish someone would build real cars like this. The front windshield frame could serve as a rollbar as it does here, and the fenders might serve as rubberized shock absorbers protecting the driver from broadside collisions.

Here's (above) what appears to be the second floors of two adjacent buildings. Actually it's one building with two stylized fronts. I'm guessing that the second floor interiors are one extended room with two different levels connected by steps.

Well, that's all I have room for now.

DISNEYLAND'S "PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN"

Like so many others I'm a huge fan of the Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Disneyland. I won't include many photos of the ride. In photography the ride appears to be a series of static department store window displays and it really is much more than that. The sounds and smells, the tactile sensations of boat and wind and temperature, and the feeling brought on by artfully contrasting 3D enclosures are so important to the experience that photos are inadequate to describe what's going on.

The ride breaks down into several parts: I) the Blue Bayou swamp, 2) the extended trip through the pirate cave,  3) the battle between the pirate ship and the Spanish fortress, 4) the sack of Port Royal, and 5) an extended trip under the wharfs of the burning city.

The highlights of the ride for me are the two "extended" mood pieces involving the cave and the wharf. On paper they probably seem like unnecessary digressions and I wouldn't be surprised if some of Disney's people argued for a more consistent, more story driven approach. Walt was right, though. The best rides are about mood and subtext.

I imagine the roller coaster-like trip through the cave was a necessity brought on by the need to move the boats to a large building outside the park. What impresses me is that Walt made a virtue of necessity by making the details of the trip so interesting.

Somebody must have researched what real caves were like. These aren't just slap-dash contrivances on chicken wire frames, these are atmospheric recreations of real caves which were not made for the convenience of man.

There's a poignancy to it, a feeling that the world is staggeringly beautiful and full of menace at the same time. For me the periodic displays of skeletons and pirate loot are just icing on the cake.

The battle between ship and fortress is reminiscent of Conrad's moody description of a sea to shore battle in "Heart of Darkness." Ships sometimes had bigger guns than did the shore forts of the day but few ships would risk a direct shootout with a fortress unless the fight was a diversion for a land attack. We can imagine that in this case it was.

The looting of the city comes off as tragic. It's disturbing to think that civilization is so vulnerable to the depredations of barbarians.

Disney wisely lightened up the situation with humor but the final slow and moody trip under the embers (above) of a burning wharf reveals Walt's true feelings about the situation...that the destruction of the city was a horrifying disaster.

All this talk about pirates makes me think of my favorite pirate (above), Captain Kidd.

Kidd started out with the intention of killing pirates and making a fortune off the bounties. With the aid of wealthy backers (which might have included the King), he built a new type of fighting ship (below) designed solely for the purpose of hunting pirates.

It (above) had an abbreviated keel for chasing pirates in the shallows, and oars for when the wind failed. It was long and narrow with extra guns and extra sails so it could outrun and outfight almost any ship that tried to escape. Not only that but Kidd personally chose the crew who consisted of the most honest and skilled sailors he could find. It seemed like a project that couldn't possibly fail.

But fail it did. Unfortunately for Kidd his proud crew mooned what they considered the inferior British Navy as they sailed out of port and the Navy retaliated by seizing them. Kidd was forced to replace the crew with thugs and criminals that he recruited in the New World.

It didn't take the thugs (above) long to realize that a ship designed for hunting pirates would make the ultimate pirate ship. They threatened to mutiny unless Kidd turned pirate himself. He reluctantly did, all the while attempting to smuggle notes to the British asking for help. When the English finally caught him they didn't buy any of his excuses and hanged and gibbeted him on a London dock.

If you're interested in reading fiction about pirates I can recommend two books. One (above) is by Rafael Sabatini, a true disciple of Alexander Dumas. The story in the book is fairly close to the one in the Errol Flynn movie, but it's worth reading even if you know everything that's going to happen.

The other book is the one by Tim Powers. My guess is that Powers was heavily influenced by the Pirate ride in Disneyland and his voodoo-laced book heavily influenced the Pirate movie, which came later. Accounts on the net differ. All I know for sure is that Disney bought the rights to the book and based the fourth Pirates movie on it.

A commenter recommends a novel called "The Black Corsair," but my library doesn't have an English translation.

A nice poster, eh? I wonder if you can still buy it.