There seem to be ways, both big and small, that the parks are starting to turn a corner. We discussed several of these recently in Wait Times Are Down, But Attendance Is Up at Walt Disney World. Here’s How Both Can Be True.
That post speculated that efficiency had improved thanks to steady increases to institutional knowledge at Walt Disney World. After all, Disney had already confirmed to us that this has happened in the California parks, with Disneyland having 1.5 million more rides or ‘guests carried’ during the last fiscal year due to increased attraction availability.
Things got bad post-COVID. The big driver was the loss of institutional knowledge with the furloughs and layoffs back in 2020. Maintenance departments were decimated and now have far fewer years of tenure. The increased daily downtime, breakdowns, non-working effects, and lower show quality standards in the post-reopening era were the most immediate way the lost institutional knowledge was felt at Walt Disney World.
It was the same story at Walt Disney Imagineering. Way back in November 2020, we started sounding the alarms based on things we’d been hearing about furloughs, forced retirements, and the long-term ramifications on the next development cycle and beyond.
That was before the mistake of forced (and thankfully, failed) relocation to Lake Nona. The negative ramifications of losing seasoned and skilled Imagineers have been evident at Walt Disney World and Disneyland over the last ~6 years. The loss of institutional knowledge has resulted in perplexing decisions, from the use of non-durable materials in designs to maintenance woes.
We’ve also heard that one of the biggest impediments to gearing back up for big projects–and multiple of them around the globe–is that Imagineering didn’t have enough people with the requisite experience. That so much institutional knowledge had been lost, along with the people capable of helming those projects. That WDI needed to staff up, and fast, with a lot of on-the-job training and smaller-scale projects.
Thankfully, that has gone pretty well! It has helped tremendously that, when Bruce Vaughn returned to helm Imagineering, he also brought back many older ex-Imagineers as consultants to mentor younger staffers. Joe Rohde’s return is the most visible and prolific example, but he’s far from the only one. At each of the last two D23 Expos, I’ve seen familiar faces in the Imagineering booth or giving presentations. When I ask about this, the answer is always the same: “oh yeah, they’re back as a consultant.”
This is starting to pay dividends in countless ways, including some that are (fingers crossed) still invisible to us with the creative direction and quality of ongoing projects like Tropical Americas, Monstropolis, Piston Peak, Villains Land, and more. There’s also one very visible way I want to take a moment to celebrate: Walt Disney World has really been on a roll with repainting projects lately!
A prime example of this is the recent Cinderella Castle makeover to remove the princess pink look for the 50th and restore the classic color scheme. As discussed in How Walt Disney World Executed the Excellent Cinderella Castle Repainting, that project was managed flawlessly.
It wasn’t just the project management, though, as a well-led but ugly outcome wouldn’t have had us singing any praises. The execution was also flawless, and this is now my all-time favorite look of Cinderella Castle.
The added contrast with the deeper roof and lighter facade, along with the gold accents give this added depth and dimension, like Cinderella Castle 4D, as compared to even the best version of the pre-2020 look. The redone Cinderella Castle was inspired by the original appearance, with some detailing also (seemingly) drawn from Tokyo Disneyland.
Cinderella Castle is the exemplar of phenomenal painting projects at Walt Disney World, but not the only one. It used to be the case that we’d dread facade work, as the fruits would often mean lost detailing and haphazard results. But Disney has been on a roll lately, and with everything from rides to resorts (Lakeshore Lodge excepted, but that’s a different beast).
Examples abound in Tomorrowland, Animation Courtyard, Crescent Lake, monorail loop resorts, and beyond. The latest of these are Hurly Burly Bar at BoardWalk (photo above courtesy of bioreconstruct) and the Tower of Terror at Disney’s Hollywood Studios. Clearly this is a concerted effort, as there’s been a lot of fantastic facade work happening lately.
Walt Disney World really deserves praise for its newfound painting prowess, and we can’t help but wonder whether this is another fruit of the improved relationship among Walt Disney Imagineering, Facilities Asset Management, and Walt Disney World Resort leadership. (See How WDW is Reinvesting in the Classics to Improve Guest Satisfaction by 15-20%.) Whatever the explanation, another great example just materialized in Magic Kingdom…
Haunted Mansion’s Restored 1971 Facade
After mysterious construction permits were filed late last year for Haunted Mansion, scrim went up in January and the entire facade was surrounded by February. While other work around Haunted Mansion remains ongoing (more on this later), the exterior is done as of August, and the restored facade looks fantastic.
When we say restored, we really mean it. The project team on Haunted Mansion presumably used the original 1971 exterior as its primary reference point, or perhaps the current facade at Tokyo Disneyland, which still maintains its original 1983 appearance.
The end result is a Haunted Mansion exterior with far more dimensionality and depth. The previous facade was fine, and I don’t think anyone was actively complaining about the way Haunted Mansion looked. I know that I certainly wasn’t. But seeing a before vs. after shows a night and day difference, almost like going from a 1990s CRT to 4K display.
There are several noticeable changes, but the big-picture one for me is more contrast. The bricks are a darker reddish-brown, while the cornerstone trim is gray instead of both being a lighter beige or sandy tone. This alone really makes the Haunted Mansion pop, and draws your eye deeper into its exterior.
Another significant one is that the cupola dome now has a green finish, just like it had in 1971 (or has in 2026 in Japan). This was a gold or bronze color last year and looked nice, but also blended into the rest of the exterior. Now it demands your attention.
This makes guests more likely to notice the wrought-iron roof cresting and the bat weathervane on top of the dome, both of which appear refreshed. The rest of the roofing is still black, just as it was before, but also looks as if it was replaced or at least restored (less unintentional weathering from the Florida sun).
The downspouts were refreshed with weathered, black detailing and really punctuate the facade. To the point, in fact, that I just noticed that two of them were added at some point between 1971 and the 2000s!
The conservatory’s wrought iron framing appears to be a slightly darker green. That was really the one thing that already stood out in the old color scheme, and it continues to command attention.
That’s really the “theme” of this whole repainting project: commanding guests’ attention. There’s just so much depth and detail here that beckons the eye, and invites it to linger for a while.
None of it is visually busy or chaotic (after all, this look was purposefully picked in 1971 by the original designers for a reason); it all just works and looks fantastic. It also, thankfully, looks period-appropriate with the right amount of weathering. There was a time when Disney refreshed exteriors and made them look a little too new, making them out of step with adjacent structures and the setting of their surroundings.
All in all, it’s great to see this project executed at such a high level, especially at a time when Haunted Mansion is a more dominant fixture in the Magic Kingdom skyline. Don’t get me wrong, it was always a powerful and foreboding visual, but now it stands out more from all around Liberty Square and Frontierland, rising above the construction walls that “conceal” the Giant Magic Kingdom Dirt Pit.
Here are a ton of photos that I’ve taken of the what’s old is new again Haunted Mansion facade throughout the day at Magic Kingdom:
What’s to Come for Haunted Mansion
Haunted Mansion is on the far edge of the Piston Peak National Park and Villains Land expansion. Work in the surrounding area remains very active. In addition to that aforementioned pit, there continues to be construction and demolition right up against the Haunted Mansion overflow queue.
On the demolition side, the long-defunct landing for the Mike Fink Keel Boats is now gone and presumably will be absorbed into Piston Peak. Construction-wise, the old building on the path that was used for a covered overflow queue to Haunted Mansion is being expanded (below right).
If memory serves me, this structure used to be where FastPass distribution was located back in the paper days. I don’t think this had anything to do with the Keel Boats, but am not 100% sure. It seems safe to assume this will offer more queue space.
Inside the attraction, Haunted Mansion is also looking great. There had been high-profile reports of the hanging corpse in the Stretching Room disappearing, which gained so much traction that they prompted Disney to take overdue action, cleaning the scrims and aligning the lighting. (Although it also might’ve given Disney an idea about how to quietly kill off the controversial hanging corpse without as much backlash: just let the scrim get really dirty and reduce the lighting!)
Never underestimate the power of shaming Walt Disney World into taking maintenance action. I’m only half-joking, as that does work…but has its limits. The rest of the inside is untouched, but the Stretching Rooms look better than they have in a while.
The next big question for me is what happens with the Haunted Mansion entrance and extended queue. Just because the facade is finished doesn’t mean the work is done. With Piston Peak ongoing and a path planned to connect Big Thunder and Haunted Mansion, there’s the possibility of further changes to facilitate crowd flow.
If Walt Disney World were to relocate the attraction entrance of Haunted Mansion, they could do so without actually moving the entrance “inside” the Mansion. They could get rid of the green canopy, shift the marquee over to the far left, and relocate the bulk of the queue back there.
With the green canopy gone and Haunted Mansion’s marquee moved to the left, the courtyard that currently exists in front of Haunted Mansion would open up, and the pathway connecting it to Big Thunder Mountain Railroad could be routed closer to where the green canopy is now.
There are other solutions along these lines that aren’t quite as extreme as relocating the Haunted Mansion marquee. It’s entirely possible that everything stays where it currently is, but with the addition of more extended queue.
It wouldn’t surprise me if Walt Disney World’s industrial engineers have determined that Haunted Mansion is going to see more foot traffic and higher demand once this path opens. It will likely need more queue to accommodate, especially since they don’t want the line spilling out into the new pathway connecting the lands. That could explain why the old FastPass structure is being built out. It’s already the case that even on a random weekday in the August offseason, it’s completely common to see the extended queue spilling out into Liberty Square.
Keep in mind that Disneyland just addressed similar overflow queue woes by building its extended queue; I could see Walt Disney World pulling a page from that playbook. This cannot happen in front of Haunted Mansion in the old FastPass building, but it could occur off to the side.
If Imagineers are tastefully restoring the 1971 appearance of the exterior, there’s a rather obvious second step that they might set their sights on next: the NextGen era interactive queue.
That is now underutilized and arguably outdated, and has been controversial since its installation. I wouldn’t be surprised if Imagineers cringe at this, and with money already budgeted for changes all around here for Piston Peak, might want to undo this. In fact, I would be more surprised if they do not want to get rid of the interactive queue than if they do. Removing it meshes with not just the Haunted Mansion restoration, but other recent and ongoing projects we’ve seen in Magic Kingdom.
My potentially unpopular opinion with old school, diehard Walt Disney World fans is that the interactive queue is fun. I would like to see it adjusted and the space better utilized for overflow than to throw out the concept entirely. Although I’d be fine with either–I really just think Haunted Mansion needs more purpose-built queue space.
One thing we do now know is that the mystery structure for which land clearing is happening behind Haunted Mansion is not for an extended queue or the Haunted Mansion Parlor. Instead, it’s for (drumroll): restrooms!
I’d still love to see the Haunted Mansion Parlor (or the once rumored table service restaurant) added somewhere in Liberty Square or periphery of Piston Peak. We previously named this Disney’s Best Bar and the #1 Highlight of the Disney Treasure, so it’d be great to see Haunted Mansion Parlor in Magic Kingdom. There’s also plenty of unused space (future expansion pads?) in the Villains Land plans.
Walt Disney World building an expansion on par with Piston Peak and Villains Land without any bars seems off-brand. The rave reviews for Haunted Mansion Parlor plus the smash success of Beak & Barrel would seem to suggest that, sooner or later, something like this is coming to Magic Kingdom somewhere (and Disneyland, for that matter). Just not behind the queue, as that’s where restrooms are going. It just seems too obvious given Disney’s penchant for booze, bars, and new revenue streams.
Ultimately, it’ll be interesting to see what else happens around Haunted Mansion in the coming couple of years. Given the fruits of this facade project and the massive model of Piston Peak National Park on the show floor of D23, we’re reassured about whatever Imagineering might have planned.
It’s probably not just great “paint people” at Walt Disney World. Thanks to the ever-increasing institutional knowledge, mentorship, and the talented last generation of Imagineers who are still around and helming the Magic Kingdom projects, we’re optimistic!
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Your Thoughts
Thoughts on the restored 1971 facade of Haunted Mansion? What about changes Imagineering could make to the queue or entrance of Haunted Mansion? Agree or disagree with our take on Walt Disney World’s improved painting prowess? Any questions? Hearing your feedback—even when you disagree with us—is both interesting to us and helpful to other readers, so please share your thoughts below in the comments!
