Disneyland Hotel Renovation Begins
According to the OC Register’s Around Disney blog:
Guests staying at the Disneyland Hotel will be sleeping on new beds alongside new furniture.
“We wanted to make the rooms a more immersive experience for our guests,” said David Gill, media relations for the Disneyland Resorts.
Construction crews began work in the Dream Tower last week on the project that will take three years to tackle the entire hotel. Work includes stripping the rooms down to the bare walls, upgrading the electrical and plumbing and then bringing in carpeting, paint, furniture, beds and bathtubs.
The new furniture is being lifted into the tower via a temporary elevator mounted to the exterior of the building.
“Some of the furniture is so big that we want to get it in and out effectively without disrupting the rest of the hotel,” Gill said.
The new look for the rooms was conceived by designers at Walt Disney Imagineering, and includes many Disney touches such as hidden Mickeys in the carpeting, the bathrooms and other niches; and headboards that light up with a fiber-optics display of the world famous Disneyland fireworks above Sleeping Beauty Castle.
Other details include a pair of Mickey Mouse hands holding the lights in the dressing area. Even Tinkerbell is hiding out in the room.
“We wanted the guests to continue to feel the Disney magic when they return to the rooms from our parks,” Gill said.
The rooms will be outfitted with energy-efficient lighting and double-paned, energy-efficient windows that will be tinted blue to give the towers a new look.
The work is being done in phases, with the Dream Tower scheduled for completion in June, followed by the Magic Tower then the Wonder Tower. All the work is expected to be complete by 2012.
Disney officials declined to give a cost for the renovations.
All of the old bathtubs will be donated to Habitat for Humanity, while the beds and furniture will be offered to cast members at a highly discounted rate with proceeds donated to local charities.