Seems to me that the Imagineering department is SEVERELY lacking in creativity....years ago I saw an opening for an Imagineering job on their website....they wanted you to have experience in graphic design, set design, animation, costume design, computer graphics, storytelling, etc...basically, they wanted imaginative and creative people to push Disney forward by not only maintaining the stories Disney made famous, but expanding on them and creating new stories....this shed, among other things, is a telling moment that the Iger Company (it's not Disney anymore) does not care about creativity or imagination....all they want to do nowadays is drain the public's wallet dry and exploit the Disney nostalgia factor to its limit ☹️
That's a Six Flags information kiosk. It's a prefab default building in Planet Coaster. It's a bathroom stall in a zoo. It looks like Disney just moved a staff building from the back-lot to the front-lot.
Hey Brickey, as a designer for over 30 years who has worked with and is good friends with past imagineers I would like to thank you for this video…..you made several great points. Needless to say I hated this shop from the moment I saw it. For reference a perfect example of Disneyland’s classic scale and proportion is at Main Street where building sizes are a fraction of full scale. The street’s charm derives from a feeling that you are ‘in control’ of the street and not overwhelmed by its architecture. The loss of Disney’s design language with this shop along with its obstruction of sight lines to the mansion and Tiana (both directions) is a sad day for any Disney fan.
I blame the west’s quality design collapse on drugs. Im guessing the architectural students were high during class, resulting in zero absorption of the information. If this barnacle is their testament of taste then we’ve already gone around the bend.
So much of the design is chintzy. Wrong theme colors. Wrong styling for both Haunted Mansion and Bayou. Worst of all is for such a large structure it wastes so much space with ranch house overhanging roof and double vaulted roof. Commercial could have stored and showcased more product within a smaller structure that was more on theme. A wasted opportunity.
I really appreciate your critique and how it’s based on actual design principles and analysis as opposed to just complaining. I also appreciate the fact that you recognized Disney was going to make a gift shop, so you’re not completely criticizing that decision, you’re acknowledging that there are better ways they could’ve done it.
BLM ruined Disneyland. All these problems are rooted in getting rid of splash mountain. I will never forgive the money laundering insurrectionist assholes in BLM.
I am speechless.....Myself as a former Disney Animator, and former Imagineer, this is one of the worst pieces of garbage in Disneyland, that I have ever seen!!! Don't these people follow the decorum of Design, there, anymore???They have an extensive set of rules, and specifics, for artistic, perspective, and representation. It is a learning tradition, and a right of passage! This piece of junk, is all wrong, and really, it needs to go, and cannot be fixed. I LOVE your heartfelt, amazing ideas to help salvage this junk, they are great, but the canvas, the building, it's size, the direction it is pointing, is ALL WRONG!! Your ideas, although perfect, would be like putting a bandaid on a dike! This thing has got to go, and a wonderful Carriage house design, or an old tiny Church, like you said; stellar ideas, need to replace it! This thing is too big, no forced perspective, blocks the Mansion, blocks the Mountain, etc! UGH!!!! This is terrible!!!! Love your stuff, and your observations. You would have made a great Imagineer, Brickey!!! 😃
BLM ruined Disneyland. All these problems are rooted in getting rid of splash mountain. I will never forgive the money laundering insurrectionist assholes in BLM.
They dropped a pre-fab 3 bedroom 2 bath house in the middle of a Disney theme park. It's too big. It's too ugly. And it does not fit in aesthetically. There's are Imagineering stories going on with the Haunted Mansion and Tiana's ride; but then someone dropped a national park restroom stop in the middle of the walkway! I have no doubt that Walt is rolling.
I would say Disney broke the fourth wall on this one. this building completely pulls you out of the moment. For those of you who work in theater or film. As a Set Dresser in Hollywood working for all the major studios, I totally agree with you. I’ve been a prop man for 36 years, when I go to Disneyland, I feel immersed and I’m usually so inspired about everything tying together and all the little details. My neighbor used to be part of the park, planning and hiring of all the crafts people. I’m gonna have to show this to her and see what she says.
This should have been a greenhouse-style building as part of the mansion, with LCD screens lining the exterior, displaying eerie scenes that blend seamlessly with the greenhouse interior.
Bingo! I really don't get what this is supposed to be, an outhouse? A barn? And the fact it's jutted out from the Mansion and Tiana's really makes it stand out, in a bad way.
@@chrisdisney8201 It's trying to look like a Victorian carriage house. Brickey's right -- it would never be sitting way outside the gates like that and it would echo the fancy detailing of the main house. They really blew it.
It was Walt Disney himself who basically said, "Don't make movies to make money, make money to make movies." The whole point behind Walt's genius was that he wanted people to feel immersed in a story as they enjoyed the park, which in turn would make people come more often, ensuring a healthy cash flow. Today's Disney cares more about profit than storytelling, so everything is soulless and lacking creativity and imagination. That's why the Disney company today is falling apart, along with other obvious problems. Companies like Disney need to stop caring about money first, and more about what brought money in the first place.
we've moved past profit being the main motivator into an era where they are more concerned with wielding their cultural influence to drive ideological social agendas.
Greed in this country has become a sickness with rich people. All of sudden millions are not enough, billions are not enough they are aiming for trillions. It's disgusting.
BLM ruined Disneyland. All these problems are rooted in getting rid of splash mountain. I will never forgive the money laundering insurrectionist assholes in BLM.
It’s supposed to be a carriage house??? This video is wild! With every new piece of information, my jaw drops lower and lower. Thank you for going through what is wrong with this building. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but you made it so clear!! The lack of forced perspective is so jarring! Especially in Disneyland, which is like the home of forced perspective lol! It sticks out like a sore thumb, and I’m not here for it. Edit: also, there was nothing wrong with the small cart and seating area. You’re so right, it fit the theme so well, with the eerie feeling and “dead” space lol. They really messed up this area.
Thats a wonderful solution. it could follow the pathing suggested in the video, it also would let you really get dwarfed by the mansion coming out as you are still lower than the street level! (just remember drains for the rain and your fine!) if the need is to separate the two rides, it could easily have a stocky looking mausoleum above it with an Ivy wall encroaching on the side of the waterway so it fits a sort of duel theme.
I'm obsessed with going underground at Disneyland, due to lack of space. I honestly would love to see a 12 story hole filled with rides and the theming somewhere 😂
Great idea. The whole video has great points, especially toward the end. It makes me think how cool it would have been (if they couldn’t go underground) to turn this into a house for Madame Leota or Dr. Facilier, tied to tarot cards or something similar, to bridge the two stories and allow to keep some perspective. Great review and ideas.
To me, the Haunted Mansion and the Pirates of the Carribean will always be the heart of Disneyland. Nothing should ever be done to diminish those areas.
The mistake with this building’s size has finally made me realize just how much forced perspective is at work with Haunted Mansion and Splash Mountain. I remember the first time I rode Splash Mountain, and it scared the crap out of me. I thought we were a hundred feet up in the final drop, and not just fifty. I didn’t appreciate the forced perspective, because I wasn’t even consciously aware of it after all these years.
The fact that even David from FreshBaked! is bothered by this building should tells Disney everything they need to know about how badly they messed this one up. David is extremely forgiving and optimistic when it comes to Disneyland, so his mild concern about this exit gift shop should be interpreted as an architectural disaster. 😊
Man it look like a refurbished pizza hut, but yes this needs to worthy of a place at Disneyland. It was added in with no feeling and love. Great video bro. What would Walt think of this building?
I don't think Walt would approve either. This is my first look at the building & I totally agree that the esthetic is disappointing. Your ideas should have been considered. I'm very disappointed & haven't even been there to see it up close yet!👎🏻👎🏻👎🏻3 thumbs down.
Brickey, you are becoming my favorite Disneyland reporter. I appreciate the honesty opposed to the tired Disney apologists. This building is such a missed opportunity and unforced error that we cannot unsee.
@@hikerdamion you can always believe my praise because I’ll always be honest about things that I don’t like. There’s no point to not keeping it real. A lot of these people are “auditioning” for a job that doesn’t exist and they’re never going to get.
Actually yeah... After the 2017 wildfires in Waterton Lakes National Park here in Canada, they rebuilt all the burned out infrastructure as these little craftsman-style buildings in almost these same shades of green and yellow 😆
And a good percentage skill retired because Disneyland and Disney world have been around for a long long time Parks don't age unless you let them but people do.
I had to say one more thing because you nailed it when you talked about the appearance. I tell people that I could just walk around Disneyland and you go through some of the back parts and there's still all those little design details well you never quite lose the fantasy. The gate the fences everything the tiny little touches. That's what makes standing in line for 3 hours worth it. I want to cry I really do 😢😢😢😢
My background is engineering and architecture. Problems with traffic flow, scale, perspective, materials, and everything else you mentioned. For goodness sake, the posts for the overhang alone make me cringe. They're within the ride exit path! The roof on my back yard shed has more character than the cheap shingles they put on that thing. The overhangs stick out too far. The trim is too big. This is a do-over because there's no fixing the scale of this thing. Uuughh, I hate being so negative but we have to speak out. Hideous. I think they blew their budget on the ride entrance. Thank you for another excellent video! Edit: Looking at the thumbnail, the lanterns hanging from the cartoonish front overhang are larger than the "carriage" lights on the wall. This is backwards for forced perspective! 😂😢
The fake shingles are terrible -- same issue on the Tiana Bayou Adventure building. Disney needs to assign a team to create a new, more realistic simulated shake shingle roof material to be used in their parks.
@@HeyBrickeyI am wondering if they tried to merge the two themes together….but for aesthetics that is no Carriage house, they usually are taller with a more pointed roof. I believe my old house in El Segundo was a version of a carriage house at one time. It was shaped more like a doll house and I had no attic at all the upstairs ceiling was the roof! I had wood clapboard siding.
Wow. Disney really dropped the ball. That doesn't look like it belongs there. Shame. I hope over time the people at Disney realize what a mistake they made.
I just don't understand how this got approved, let alone built, without SOMEone realizing this design has zero connection to the story of Haunted Mansion. Haunted Mansion is my all time favorite ride of any theme park and I was really looking forward to it having its own gift shop.
For any of us true classic Disney and especially Disneyland fans that were fortunate enough to grow up with it in our backyard, it's been hard to watch the decline and cheapening of the Disney name, while prices just get higher, decions like these just solidify the true essence and soul is completely gone.. It shows in the parks and their films.. End of an era..
Agreed. In the early 2000's the cheapest annual pass was $99, which would've been fine for me, since I was in law school and could go during the week (I planned to go just to sit in the atmosphere while I read and briefed cases for school, but I never ended up buying one, which I regret now). And when I got married in 2008, my then husband and I had the $269 passes that worked almost every Sunday, so we'd usually go on Tuesdays and Sundays. That was such an awesome time (lived in Tustin then). It's gotten outrageous. Now we only go when my aunt can get her plus 3 more in (unlimited number of visits, but has a lot of black out days) because the tickets are just ridiculously priced. It's sad because my daughter is a super Disney fan (she's 14) and she wants to go with her friends, but no one (including us) can afford it.
@@shannonduane30 I too had the passes back in the day when they were affordable. It was especially nice when our daughter was very young (we were young too 22 & 24 when she was born) it was a great place to take our daughter, get some dinner and go on a ride or two. Disneyland now is packed and soooooo expensive. We still go often but only because daughter works there and can get us in for free (but as mentioned above lots of black out days) I have looked into passes again, but we figured for the 3 of us (before she worked there) we could go on a very nice vacation. Plus in order for it to be "worth it" we would have to go ALL the time, and while I love Disneyland I also like doing other things. (Esp living in So Cal there are so many things to do, places to go, new restaurants to try) Shout out to Tustin (I work in Tustin) and live in Orange (We can see the fireworks from our house)
We were just there and my kids asked, “What is that for?” which tells you that it is not doing what it was meant for. With all the other buildings you know what it’s there for by the way it’s decorated.
I assume they were trying to make this building blend in with both the haunted mansion and Tiana’s, although of course unsurprisingly they failed miserably at it. It looks like something I’d see at six flags or on a farm, not in a years of a vintage mansion full of ghosts. They could have done way better with this, but unfortunately we ended up getting the “we bought this shed at Home Depot”-looking haunted mansion gift shop 😂
@@dayoldbread1696 shouldn't have been that hard! The Princess and The Frog had voodoo in it! They could've made the shop magic themed and it would've worked for both rides!
But it's a store, which means people spending more money on things. Disney will ALWAYS say yes to that, even if it means ruining the park aesthetic. Sad but true.
I will forever call it the Haunted Mansion Depot. Not only that, but that building and the horrible Haunted Mansion queue ruin the sight line to the Haunted Mansion which stood alone and ominously off the path. Now it's just cramped behind a bunch of nonsense.
You are absolutely right! The scale is too large, and the carriage house would never have been placed in front of the main house! Then there's the aesthetics. It does look like a prefab product from Tuff Shed and doesn't tie into the mansion at all. I hope Disney is watching you and listening! They've ruined the grandeur of Haunted Mansion and killed the illusion. It feels like they rushed it for the 70th anniversary. The park deserves better than this eyesore.
The first thing that struck me, right before it was mentioned in the video, was the flat paint job. I've always loved to walk around Disneyland just looking at the masterful paint jobs on everything -- the texturing, combinations of colors, etc -- used to make things look old, weathered, and just more REAL. This has none of that -- no aging, no weathering, no imagination ... Just brand-new, flat, and boring.
I agree with you about the building design. I hope that the park makes an attempt at adding some touches to the paint to give it more of a Disney story feel. It looks like a modern manufactured barn. I am surprised to learn that the marketing for the new structure suggests that this is a carriage house, and meant to house the carriage in front of the Mansion. The Mansion carriage is a funeral carriage. Isn't there a coffin inside?
Ok, I took the bait and watched your video. I was born in Torrance, CA in December 1955, so you can see my connection to Disneyland there. At first I was thinking this guy is nothing more than a lot of yadda yadda yadda… But I’ll admit, because I’m an adult, that I was wrong. (I’ll give myself credit for continuing to watch, though.) Your observations, critique, and suggestions were quite good, well thought out, and I thought minus the hyperbole a lot of RUclips “critics” embrace. Well done 👍🏼.
I absolutely agree with you. This is the biggest eyesore in the park. I was so disappointed when the walls came down. What were they thinking? They really failed with this one.
Exactly and After seeing stuff like this lately I worry about the quality in terms of how the avengers e ticket ride and expansion will turn out. Those better be good because if not, it’ll sting even more considering it’ll have been 10 years since the ride was originally announced back in 2019 to when it finally opens
@@mistyluvr I kept waiting for it to get better and when the walls came down I still held hope, but then they announced opening this winter and started decorating the exterior and I thought to myself “it’s not gonna get better, time to make the video 😢”
Thank you! From the beginning, this felt wrong, but I don't have the design background to understand why. I love your explanation. I look forward to seeing more of your videos.
“Friend, you failed Walt Disney’s vision.” Woah! It’s getting real, but wait, that’s how Brickey always rolls. Thanks for giving it to us straight, whether good, bad, magical, or mistake.
With all that blank vinyl siding, it looks like they were going for the double-wide mobile home aesthetic, but they didn't quite have the budget or artistic vision to pull it off.
What's worse is that lakes help add coolness to the surrounding area (look up "lake breeze"). When Cars goes up, the park is going to get much, much hotter.
I'm a horseman and I can tell you that whoever designed that had no idea what an actual carriage house looks like. I was trying to figure out what look they were going for, and then you said carriage house and I was literally shocked. If it is based on one, it's a style I've never seen. It's a nice building, it just doesn't seem to have any connection to the mansion at all, nor does it resemble any carriage house (especially from the mansion's era) I've seen in my studies or experience.
I can't believe Disney stooped this low. You are so right that this sticks out like a sore thumb. There is nothing of value to this building, other than indoor shopping space, but there are lots of negative effects, as you've addressed.
that's basically what disneyland is,a big model train set. within it's train tracks everything should be MINIATURE versions of buildings,not full scale.
Thank you for saying this. First time I saw it I thought the mansion looks so tiny. So sad. My second thought was it doesn’t match. They need to use some brown paint and make it look weathered. Or whatever it takes to make it look used. Hoping someone who matters will happen to listen to your video.
The draw to Disneyland is its human scale, the park hugs you. That’s why Galaxy’s Edge feels so off but at least it exists “outside the berm” and doesn’t clash with anything else. This building is monster. Edit - I made this comment before I even watched the video. Bricky, you were spot on, you put into words exactly thing I was thinking.
As someone who works on theme parks for a living, in my opinion, the simple reason this has happened is that the park itself paid for, and had this done, and Imagineering was not involved. It's really that simple. Thanks for your quality critique. You nailed it.
Hey, just wanted to post a thank you to you and say your videos, especially this one, where you take the time to give honest artistic critiques, are great. I especially loved the moment you take to address the original designer directly to give them a "hey, I get it, sometime management messes up the original vision for management thinking" pass card. God knows we've all been there. But your feedback shows the true spirit of artist giving great, honest and useful feedback to help improve on something. Not negative just to tear it down feedback that we've become so use to, especially in the age of the internet. Its that feedback that educates and lets other artist grow in their art. Keep up the great videos and work that you're doing!
This looks like something that would be in the "western" area of a Six Flags park (specifically, it looks like something the new Cedar Fair management would build). That's fine for an amusement park focused on thrill rides and charging a fraction of Disney prices, but it looks very out of place in a theme park like Disneyland.
Exactly I’d expect to see this at great America/knotts or six flags magic mountain, not at Disneyland. Also it seems like universal is stepping up its game while Disney is barely trying at times
In this video you did a great job of showing an example of how so much of the original magic of Disneyland is gone. The magic as envisioned by Walt Disney himself. I was born a year after Disneyland first opened and throughout my childhood I spent at least one day each year at the park, often more. In High School I was friends with the son of the gal that managed the personnel department at Disneyland and by going through her office we could bypass the admission gate. I had another friend who’s first job was to work nights at Disneyland on a crew whose only job was to remove chewing gum from the roads and walkways and from under seats and tables and anywhere else people could conceivably discard their gum. Walt Disney spared no expense to keep the park pristine, it was the foundation upon which the magic was built. Whenever anything broke or appeared shabby the craftsmen responsible for that area were empowered to quickly do whatever it took to make it right. And these guys were true craftsmen and they shared Walt Disney's passion for everything being perfect. But that all changed in the mid-1980’s when Eisner took over as CEO. My brother experienced this change first hand. In the mid-1970’s my brother went to work for Ganahal Lumber, oldest lumberyard in California and, at least at that time, the largest retail lumber business in Southern California. And they were located about a mile east of Disneyland on Ball road. Ganahal did a lot of business with Disneyland, not so much on the big projects but they were the go-to place for the day to day stuff. Disneyland always had an open PO on file with Ganahal and whenever any of the craftsmen at Disneyland needed lumber or hardware for a repair they could get it at Ganahal. It would be charged to the open PO, no questions asked. Once my brother started working at Ganahal it did not take long for him to be promoted to retail sales manager and around 1980 he became the head of contractor sales, the department to which the guys from Disneyland went when they needed something. He got to know many of them and friendships developed. He saw in them the love and passion they had for their jobs, the desire they had to keep the magic alive in a manner consistent with what Walt Disney wanted. But this all changed around 1985. Disneyland management informed Ganahal that there would no longer be open POs, that for every purchase the Disneyland employee would be bringing in a PO specific to a particular project and on each PO there would be a cap on how much the employee could spend. And, probably knowing that their craftsmen would have problems adapting to the new system, the management at Disneyland warned Ganahal not to extend credit to any of their employees that came in without a PO. They told Ganahal that if they gave their people materials without first getting a PO that the payment would never come. And sure enough that is exactly what happened. The craftsmen, especially the old timers, came in as predicted, asking for materials with the promise of a PO and payment later. It was part of their DNA that when things needed repair that it had to happen before anyone noticed. To wait days, often weeks, to make a repair on something the park visitors could see was unacceptable to them and contrary to the vision Walt Disney had instilled in them. But when they had to write up a work order with cost estimates, get it approved, take bids for the materials then put in the paperwork for the PO, it took that long. And management was turning down lots of the work orders for things that clearly needed to be repaired. So as these craftsmen, people who my brother knew and considered to be friends, came in asking for materials without a PO my brother had to turn them down. Over time these guys either adapted to the new system or stopped coming in, apparently having left Disney to find work elsewhere. And for those that did continue to come in, there was a sense that their spirits were broken and that they no longer had the love and passion for their work that they had before. And at the same time I noticed changes as I continued to visit the park. One of the first things I noticed was that as the figurines of Disney characters scattered throughout the park became faded or fell into disrepair, that rather than being replaced by new versions of the origional they were either left in disrepair or replaced by painted plywood cutouts. And I started noticing that as the fascia and trim on buildings and other structures fell into disrepair it wasn't being fixed. I remember standing in the line for space mountain and noticing how bad things were getting. The line went through a long tunnel surrounded by walls made of panels backlit with blue lights. I saw that the trim around many of the panels was missing. And the holes where screws had once been were made obvious because the lights that backlit the panels showed brightly through. And as I continued to visit the park I saw the magic continue to fade. I now live in the Pacific Northwest but still share one thing in common with Disneyland: I live about a mile from I-5. But I’m also about 2 miles from the Canada border. I still make it down to SoCal every year or 2 but it’s probably been 20 years since I’ve been to Disneyland. I hear about the new rides and shows and it sounds pretty exciting. But as exciting as that all might be I would far rather go back to the simpler park of my childhood where the magic truly existed.
I can see what the original concept art was going for... That wasn't even a carriage house, but a creole-style shoppe like the Lafitte's Blacksmith Bar or Marie Laveau's House of Voodoo in New Orleans. And that would have worked, if you kept a small scale. But instead they ended up with a giant, off-the-shelf Craftsman barn. And, well, okay... Disney has long-since stopped caring about the integrity of their parks, and there's no point to me caring more than they do. It's not like they're asking me.
True story. I haven’t been to a Disney park now since 2014 and they’ve really dumbed down my beloved Epcot with characters, so I don’t ever see myself going back.
Just looking at it on video and I want to move it out of the way, it is a major eyesore. They are so used to the whining they could care less and have gotten worse in these last years for sure.
Awesome video, Brickey! You’re completely right about how this new building doesn’t have much character. A few design tricks and some rustic-looking siding could have made a big difference. I don’t understand why they made the roof peak so tall. Thanks for sharing what many of us have been feeling but couldn’t express!
You nailed it. The perspective is WAY off and it completely blocks the anticipation you feel when approaching the mansion from the west side. There is no contribution to considering scale here like the thought put into the Main Street buildings, or the mystique of discovering the nooks and crannies of other merch stores throughout the park. There is no good transition either. It looks like a toilet stop instead. Disney continues to make horrible choices. It's an eyesore, for sure. And who cares about a BB&B stores inside Disneyland anyway? Put that corporate business junk in California Adventure.
As with all modern Disney projects from the past few years, just put it back the way it was. How could they not visualize this? 3d design is pretty much standard now. It should have been modeled and rendered in animation.
Hey Brickey. I love your channel because you always focus on the Nexus of all the creative factors that makes Disneyland what it is. I wish they put a Tim Burton aesthetic to the building, 45° angles and like you mentioned a recessed foundation. By the way, what is that in the top window 🪟 at three minutes in? Maybe something for the future 👻 archives… Cheers bro. 😎
Disneyland totally could have made one building with two facades, one to compliment the Haunted Mansion and one to complicate Tiana’s Bayou. And it seems that it should be pushed further back in order not to detract from either attraction. It overwhelmed the site line in a negative way. What a shame. The building looks like it belongs in Downtown Disney.
I appreciate if it helps break the sightlines of both attractions facades from the main pathway. That area is probably the most abrupt land transition in a US Disney castle park. But I feel like they didn't read the entire assignment...
I’m with you, it’s too big for the space. Blocks the view towards Tiana’s Bayou Adventure, so there’s no weenie drawing you towards that part of the park.
You are spot on 1000% here brother Bricky. I have been looking at this for ages trying to figure out the problem. You nailed it. Massive hulking barn misplaced that kills all the surrounding perspectives. Thanks Disney for foistering this ugliness on us. To be fair the new queue area is an improvement but there was also so much opportunity to plus it but they failed there aswell . Current Disney are spoiling the park with their cost cutting and mismanagement.
OMG. I'm so glad you covered this. I'm still shocked when Disney does non-Disney things... like using completely obvious construction walls, rather than working in a design or aesthetic that fits the theme they are covering up... and (I know I'm gonna get hate for this, but) when Disney uses the Tim Burton theming for the holidays which has always felt like nothing more than a cash grab to me. The Haunted Mansion gift shop is all of that. Not only does it NOT fit the theme, like the Pirates gift shop does, it feels like an unnecessary cash grab. By the way, hope you get well soon Brickey. Sounds like you're dealing with a bit of congestion. I recommend Zicam highly.
Your analysis is spot on. Totally agree with you. Disney did not do their homework, went as cheap as possible or both. This is a building mistake that will cost them ten times more to fix. And they should fix it immediately.
You could have had the same footprint for shopping but with better dimensions for theming if it was 1 building to look like 2 or more smaller buildings together.
Exactly! The could have done a much smaller (2/3 size) stone carriage house and then have a wood "addition" (additional 1/3) off the side (all connected inside) as if it was expanded at some later point. It would have created more quirky architectural interest, better scale, and more "storytelling through design."
As a fellow designer who TOTALLY understands how ops/merch/mgmt can affect a design - you are SPOT-ON with your analysis and suggestions. I really wanted this to be something special but the scale and level of detail is *terrible*.
@@HeyBrickey I'm hoping things like paint detail, propping and additional small elements can be added. But the scale is just unforgivable, and most likely a fight won by the retail folks. The queue is really nice in terms of winding layout, lots of fun reveals and peek-throughs, and the landscaping will grow in nicely. BUT it, too, needs some more patina. And, the props look really out of scale, and very off-the-shelf. The gazing balls in particular are in contemporary colors -- they should have been mirrored mercury glass.
Hey Brickey, this was my first look at the shop. All I can do is hang my head in disappointment. Thank for taking the time to review and providing better alternatives. The one I personally like was the old church on the edge of town. Thanks again for the amazing videos you make!
We really need ppl like you back in the Disney family. You’ve captured what I’ve been thinking, when I saw it it was so lackluster and I just didn’t like it. I didn’t know why till now like this is totally right!
Super thoughtful video. Thanks for giving words to how I was feeling. I hope this video finds its way to the eyes at Disney that could make a positive change and avoid mistakes like this in the future.
I mean, the original Shipley-Leydecker house was constructed in town, so it wouldn't be so far-fetched that a carriage house would sit alongside similarly, but they'd have to reorient the "entrance" to one side (similar to what you suggested) so as to access an "alley" or "mews" next door. Totally agree that this is way too big and needs to be minimized at least visually. The overhang and its supports are overlapping the crypt exit in a weird way that adds to the oversized effect.
New Orleans Square is my favorite part of the entire park. I really do hope there's work to be done with that horrid shed thing. Thank you for weighing in with your professional eye.
This building is totally lacking in spooky or dark charm. The clashing greens are just ugly, and don’t bring the spooky. We need aged brick, ornate iron and gingerbread. It does not look like a carriage house, they were often brick.
Time to jack it up! Dig down deeper to drop it lower. Finish the exterior. Add the rod iron to match the mansion. Add a small cupola to the top. Redo the exterior with something other than siding from Home Depot. Right now it looks like a prefabricated storage shed. Currently it just sticks out too much and looks like a mistake.perhaps a few small gabled roof with windows set back in. Come on Disney… make Disney quality
The new shop looks like they just bought a shed from Home Depot.
It's because We did; Stop making fun of Us
Seems to me that the Imagineering department is SEVERELY lacking in creativity....years ago I saw an opening for an Imagineering job on their website....they wanted you to have experience in graphic design, set design, animation, costume design, computer graphics, storytelling, etc...basically, they wanted imaginative and creative people to push Disney forward by not only maintaining the stories Disney made famous, but expanding on them and creating new stories....this shed, among other things, is a telling moment that the Iger Company (it's not Disney anymore) does not care about creativity or imagination....all they want to do nowadays is drain the public's wallet dry and exploit the Disney nostalgia factor to its limit ☹️
Disney's design people work for Universal now.
Yes, we should petition that Amish, RUclipsr who repos shed for a living and have him pick it up and take it back to Home Depot.
It looks fit for a less-loved Six Flags park
That's a Six Flags information kiosk. It's a prefab default building in Planet Coaster. It's a bathroom stall in a zoo. It looks like Disney just moved a staff building from the back-lot to the front-lot.
I was thinking six flags lol 💯
Yeah. Looks a lot like a bathroom, not far from the pier, on a tourist beach.
I see I was not the only one who immediately thought of Six Flags. For Disney, putting up a building that reminds guests of Six Flags is a fail.
It looks like a container home.
I thought bathroom, too.
Hey Brickey, as a designer for over 30 years who has worked with and is good friends with past imagineers I would like to thank you for this video…..you made several great points. Needless to say I hated this shop from the moment I saw it. For reference a perfect example of Disneyland’s classic scale and proportion is at Main Street where building sizes are a fraction of full scale. The street’s charm derives from a feeling that you are ‘in control’ of the street and not overwhelmed by its architecture. The loss of Disney’s design language with this shop along with its obstruction of sight lines to the mansion and Tiana (both directions) is a sad day for any Disney fan.
Bad designers for sure.
I blame the west’s quality design collapse on drugs. Im guessing the architectural students were high during class, resulting in zero absorption of the information. If this barnacle is their testament of taste then we’ve already gone around the bend.
So much of the design is chintzy. Wrong theme colors. Wrong styling for both Haunted Mansion and Bayou. Worst of all is for such a large structure it wastes so much space with ranch house overhanging roof and double vaulted roof.
Commercial could have stored and showcased more product within a smaller structure that was more on theme. A wasted opportunity.
Thanks bud! ❤
Great comment. Thank you.
I really appreciate your critique and how it’s based on actual design principles and analysis as opposed to just complaining. I also appreciate the fact that you recognized Disney was going to make a gift shop, so you’re not completely criticizing that decision, you’re acknowledging that there are better ways they could’ve done it.
You don’t have to be an architect or an engineer to see that building sticks out like a sore thumb.
False. You definitely need to have a lifetime of art and design experience. Clearly. 😂
@@kellscrawford9076😂
😅😂
BLM ruined Disneyland. All these problems are rooted in getting rid of splash mountain. I will never forgive the money laundering insurrectionist assholes in BLM.
@@denisebrowne4630 plus what ride is it for ….. splash 💦 mountain already had a gift 🎁 shop
I am speechless.....Myself as a former Disney Animator, and former Imagineer, this is one of the worst pieces of garbage in Disneyland, that I have ever seen!!! Don't these people follow the decorum of Design, there, anymore???They have an extensive set of rules, and specifics, for artistic, perspective, and representation. It is a learning tradition, and a right of passage! This piece of junk, is all wrong, and really, it needs to go, and cannot be fixed. I LOVE your heartfelt, amazing ideas to help salvage this junk, they are great, but the canvas, the building, it's size, the direction it is pointing, is ALL WRONG!! Your ideas, although perfect, would be like putting a bandaid on a dike! This thing has got to go, and a wonderful Carriage house design, or an old tiny Church, like you said; stellar ideas, need to replace it! This thing is too big, no forced perspective, blocks the Mansion, blocks the Mountain, etc! UGH!!!! This is terrible!!!! Love your stuff, and your observations. You would have made a great Imagineer, Brickey!!! 😃
Yeah I’m glad someone said it… these other disney content creators never criticize anything they do. This shed is trash 😂
That's because they are on Disney's payroll
Walt made a place of imagination.
Today's management just sees money.
@freshbaked
They need old people on the staff. Youngsters live in neutral homes with no character. Their imaginations are flat.
I don’t even know why they needed to do that anyways
I wish they’d just remove it and acknowledge their mistake
The building is jarring and just feels like an afterthought
Cheap for sure.
Because it is? It really does stick out. That concept art was so much better.
In the film business, we call that breaking the fourth wall. It pulls you out of the moment. Big mistake.
You spelled greed and lazy wrong.
BLM ruined Disneyland. All these problems are rooted in getting rid of splash mountain. I will never forgive the money laundering insurrectionist assholes in BLM.
They dropped a pre-fab 3 bedroom 2 bath house in the middle of a Disney theme park. It's too big. It's too ugly. And it does not fit in aesthetically. There's are Imagineering stories going on with the Haunted Mansion and Tiana's ride; but then someone dropped a national park restroom stop in the middle of the walkway! I have no doubt that Walt is rolling.
Haha I just commented that it looks like a public restroom in a national park. Scrolled down and seen this comment so there must be something to it.
@@MrReaper223 lots of people thought that and Home Depot 👍
At least his head is... I want to believe the urban myth that his head is cryogenically frozen inside the Matterhorn like Futurama.
It should have been built like a mausoleum. This just looks like an afterthought.
Mausoleum is a great idea
A nice granite monument would have been a marked improvement. Even could call it Leota's Hideaway, have a coin operated fortune teller animatronic.
Yeah fantastic idea. Instantly would have become a Disneyland icon ❤
I would say Disney broke the fourth wall on this one. this building completely pulls you out of the moment. For those of you who work in theater or film. As a Set Dresser in Hollywood working for all the major studios, I totally agree with you. I’ve been a prop man for 36 years, when I go to Disneyland, I feel immersed and I’m usually so inspired about everything tying together and all the little details. My neighbor used to be part of the park, planning and hiring of all the crafts people. I’m gonna have to show this to her and see what she says.
@@HeyBrickey^ He said a Marked improvement 🎉
That shade of color reminds me of the “go away green” Disney has.
I thought that too. It's an odd color for a shop.
This should have been a greenhouse-style building as part of the mansion, with LCD screens lining the exterior, displaying eerie scenes that blend seamlessly with the greenhouse interior.
something like this: i.pinimg.com/736x/af/80/ae/af80aef99317db3630f8d0246d43e8a2.jpg
Bingo! I really don't get what this is supposed to be, an outhouse? A barn? And the fact it's jutted out from the Mansion and Tiana's really makes it stand out, in a bad way.
😅😮😮😮😮😮😮
Right? Finally, someone said it!
@@chrisdisney8201 It's trying to look like a Victorian carriage house. Brickey's right -- it would never be sitting way outside the gates like that and it would echo the fancy detailing of the main house. They really blew it.
That is seriously the most tacky thing I've ever seen at Disneyland. They're getting lazy
It was Walt Disney himself who basically said, "Don't make movies to make money, make money to make movies." The whole point behind Walt's genius was that he wanted people to feel immersed in a story as they enjoyed the park, which in turn would make people come more often, ensuring a healthy cash flow. Today's Disney cares more about profit than storytelling, so everything is soulless and lacking creativity and imagination. That's why the Disney company today is falling apart, along with other obvious problems. Companies like Disney need to stop caring about money first, and more about what brought money in the first place.
Well said- I agree completely, and couldn't have said it better.
we've moved past profit being the main motivator into an era where they are more concerned with wielding their cultural influence to drive ideological social agendas.
Very well said! Thank you.
Greed in this country has become a sickness with rich people. All of sudden millions are not enough, billions are not enough they are aiming for trillions. It's disgusting.
BLM ruined Disneyland. All these problems are rooted in getting rid of splash mountain. I will never forgive the money laundering insurrectionist assholes in BLM.
It’s supposed to be a carriage house??? This video is wild! With every new piece of information, my jaw drops lower and lower. Thank you for going through what is wrong with this building. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but you made it so clear!! The lack of forced perspective is so jarring! Especially in Disneyland, which is like the home of forced perspective lol! It sticks out like a sore thumb, and I’m not here for it.
Edit: also, there was nothing wrong with the small cart and seating area. You’re so right, it fit the theme so well, with the eerie feeling and “dead” space lol. They really messed up this area.
If I was going to put a gift shop in the Haunted Mansion, it would be an underground crypt, and it wouldn't cause traffic headaches
Love this idea! & no sight line blockage to the mansion when you come around that corner(that reveal is magic) makes you want to go in there.
Thats a wonderful solution. it could follow the pathing suggested in the video, it also would let you really get dwarfed by the mansion coming out as you are still lower than the street level! (just remember drains for the rain and your fine!) if the need is to separate the two rides, it could easily have a stocky looking mausoleum above it with an Ivy wall encroaching on the side of the waterway so it fits a sort of duel theme.
I agree. A mausoleum crypt entrance to a basement gift shop
I'm obsessed with going underground at Disneyland, due to lack of space. I honestly would love to see a 12 story hole filled with rides and the theming somewhere 😂
Great idea. The whole video has great points, especially toward the end. It makes me think how cool it would have been (if they couldn’t go underground) to turn this into a house for Madame Leota or Dr. Facilier, tied to tarot cards or something similar, to bridge the two stories and allow to keep some perspective. Great review and ideas.
To me, the Haunted Mansion and the Pirates of the Carribean will always be the heart of Disneyland. Nothing should ever be done to diminish those areas.
They’ve already been diminished when they added aspects from the movies. For example, POTC did not need a Johnny Depp animatronic.
The mistake with this building’s size has finally made me realize just how much forced perspective is at work with Haunted Mansion and Splash Mountain. I remember the first time I rode Splash Mountain, and it scared the crap out of me. I thought we were a hundred feet up in the final drop, and not just fifty. I didn’t appreciate the forced perspective, because I wasn’t even consciously aware of it after all these years.
@@drewwhitney7327 yeah for the first time ever both looked really small and insignificant.
I wouldn't be surprised if park management is actually onboard with that since TBA was trying to steer away from being scary at all
The fact that even David from FreshBaked! is bothered by this building should tells Disney everything they need to know about how badly they messed this one up. David is extremely forgiving and optimistic when it comes to Disneyland, so his mild concern about this exit gift shop should be interpreted as an architectural disaster. 😊
Man it look like a refurbished pizza hut, but yes this needs to worthy of a place at Disneyland. It was added in with no feeling and love. Great video bro. What would Walt think of this building?
Heads would roll for many reasons if Walt came back.
If he were here, he'd never allow this to happen.
Walt would prove that--unlike his TV image--he could swear like a sailor. 😝
I don't think Walt would approve either. This is my first look at the building & I totally agree that the esthetic is disappointing. Your ideas should have been considered. I'm very disappointed & haven't even been there to see it up close yet!👎🏻👎🏻👎🏻3 thumbs down.
Brickey, you are becoming my favorite Disneyland reporter. I appreciate the honesty opposed to the tired Disney apologists. This building is such a missed opportunity and unforced error that we cannot unsee.
@@hikerdamion you can always believe my praise because I’ll always be honest about things that I don’t like. There’s no point to not keeping it real. A lot of these people are “auditioning” for a job that doesn’t exist and they’re never going to get.
It looks like a visitors center at a national park to me 🤷♂
I wish it looked that good. 😑
State park, end of the fiscal year... Trying to squeeze every penny out of those last few dollars!
Actually yeah... After the 2017 wildfires in Waterton Lakes National Park here in Canada, they rebuilt all the burned out infrastructure as these little craftsman-style buildings in almost these same shades of green and yellow 😆
That’s crazy accurate 😂
pls dont forget to write your trail paper it is illegal to not lol
That building spits in the face of Walt Disney.
Why does Disney keep making unforced errors?
$$$$
The people don't have the experience, most of the skill was let go in 2020.
And a good percentage skill retired because Disneyland and Disney world have been around for a long long time Parks don't age unless you let them but people do.
I'm sorry that got torn apart I was using speech to text and since I'm using Firefox I can't edit anything.
@@sky0kast0I haven’t heard of Firefox in a decade🤯
I had to say one more thing because you nailed it when you talked about the appearance. I tell people that I could just walk around Disneyland and you go through some of the back parts and there's still all those little design details well you never quite lose the fantasy. The gate the fences everything the tiny little touches. That's what makes standing in line for 3 hours worth it. I want to cry I really do 😢😢😢😢
My background is engineering and architecture. Problems with traffic flow, scale, perspective, materials, and everything else you mentioned. For goodness sake, the posts for the overhang alone make me cringe. They're within the ride exit path! The roof on my back yard shed has more character than the cheap shingles they put on that thing. The overhangs stick out too far. The trim is too big. This is a do-over because there's no fixing the scale of this thing. Uuughh, I hate being so negative but we have to speak out. Hideous. I think they blew their budget on the ride entrance. Thank you for another excellent video!
Edit: Looking at the thumbnail, the lanterns hanging from the cartoonish front overhang are larger than the "carriage" lights on the wall. This is backwards for forced perspective! 😂😢
Thank you! I really don't get why they extended the overhang so much. The posts in front of the ride exit prove this wasn't planned creatively.
The fake shingles are terrible -- same issue on the Tiana Bayou Adventure building. Disney needs to assign a team to create a new, more realistic simulated shake shingle roof material to be used in their parks.
@@Pab-B great breakdown ❤️
@@DrStarlander it also appears the siding is a vinyl stamped to look like wood and bro they have real wood money 😂
@@HeyBrickeyI am wondering if they tried to merge the two themes together….but for aesthetics that is no Carriage house, they usually are taller with a more pointed roof. I believe my old house in El Segundo was a version of a carriage house at one time. It was shaped more like a doll house and I had no attic at all the upstairs ceiling was the roof! I had wood clapboard siding.
Wow. Disney really dropped the ball. That doesn't look like it belongs there. Shame. I hope over time the people at Disney realize what a mistake they made.
A big, unnecessary mistake. Current Disney sure knows how to ruin a masterpiece.
I just don't understand how this got approved, let alone built, without SOMEone realizing this design has zero connection to the story of Haunted Mansion. Haunted Mansion is my all time favorite ride of any theme park and I was really looking forward to it having its own gift shop.
For any of us true classic Disney and especially Disneyland fans that were fortunate enough to grow up with it in our backyard, it's been hard to watch the decline and cheapening of the Disney name, while prices just get higher, decions like these just solidify the true essence and soul is completely gone.. It shows in the parks and their films.. End of an era..
Agreed. In the early 2000's the cheapest annual pass was $99, which would've been fine for me, since I was in law school and could go during the week (I planned to go just to sit in the atmosphere while I read and briefed cases for school, but I never ended up buying one, which I regret now).
And when I got married in 2008, my then husband and I had the $269 passes that worked almost every Sunday, so we'd usually go on Tuesdays and Sundays. That was such an awesome time (lived in Tustin then).
It's gotten outrageous. Now we only go when my aunt can get her plus 3 more in (unlimited number of visits, but has a lot of black out days) because the tickets are just ridiculously priced.
It's sad because my daughter is a super Disney fan (she's 14) and she wants to go with her friends, but no one (including us) can afford it.
@@shannonduane30 I too had the passes back in the day when they were affordable. It was especially nice when our daughter was very young (we were young too 22 & 24 when she was born) it was a great place to take our daughter, get some dinner and go on a ride or two. Disneyland now is packed and soooooo expensive. We still go often but only because daughter works there and can get us in for free (but as mentioned above lots of black out days) I have looked into passes again, but we figured for the 3 of us (before she worked there) we could go on a very nice vacation. Plus in order for it to be "worth it" we would have to go ALL the time, and while I love Disneyland I also like doing other things. (Esp living in So Cal there are so many things to do, places to go, new restaurants to try)
Shout out to Tustin (I work in Tustin) and live in Orange (We can see the fireworks from our house)
It's insane that Disney nailed the new Haunted Mansion queue but failed the new Haunted Mansion exit giftshop.
We were just there and my kids asked, “What is that for?” which tells you that it is not doing what it was meant for. With all the other buildings you know what it’s there for by the way it’s decorated.
I assume they were trying to make this building blend in with both the haunted mansion and Tiana’s, although of course unsurprisingly they failed miserably at it.
It looks like something I’d see at six flags or on a farm, not in a years of a vintage mansion full of ghosts. They could have done way better with this, but unfortunately we ended up getting the “we bought this shed at Home Depot”-looking haunted mansion gift shop 😂
@@dayoldbread1696 shouldn't have been that hard! The Princess and The Frog had voodoo in it! They could've made the shop magic themed and it would've worked for both rides!
But it's a store, which means people spending more money on things. Disney will ALWAYS say yes to that, even if it means ruining the park aesthetic. Sad but true.
I will forever call it the Haunted Mansion Depot. Not only that, but that building and the horrible Haunted Mansion queue ruin the sight line to the Haunted Mansion which stood alone and ominously off the path. Now it's just cramped behind a bunch of nonsense.
Tomb Depot
I'm calling it the Haunted Tuff Shed
@@BeMoreFunny bravo 👏
I actually loved the old queue line and I didn't mind standing there for 30 min 40 min I loved the atmosphere and admiring the mansion and garden. ; /
Yea, whyyy Disney whyyyy do something without even thinking!!
You are absolutely right! The scale is too large, and the carriage house would never have been placed in front of the main house! Then there's the aesthetics. It does look like a prefab product from Tuff Shed and doesn't tie into the mansion at all. I hope Disney is watching you and listening! They've ruined the grandeur of Haunted Mansion and killed the illusion. It feels like they rushed it for the 70th anniversary. The park deserves better than this eyesore.
I looks like a storage shed you would buy in a Home Depot parking lot.
It's a pole barn.
@@kelf114 I haven’t heard that term in years 😂
Home Depot: Damn, we need to either remove this product from inventory or ban its use for anything but back yards and state fairs.
The first thing that struck me, right before it was mentioned in the video, was the flat paint job. I've always loved to walk around Disneyland just looking at the masterful paint jobs on everything -- the texturing, combinations of colors, etc -- used to make things look old, weathered, and just more REAL. This has none of that -- no aging, no weathering, no imagination ... Just brand-new, flat, and boring.
I agree with you about the building design. I hope that the park makes an attempt at adding some touches to the paint to give it more of a Disney story feel. It looks like a modern manufactured barn. I am surprised to learn that the marketing for the new structure suggests that this is a carriage house, and meant to house the carriage in front of the Mansion. The Mansion carriage is a funeral carriage. Isn't there a coffin inside?
I sort of looks like a Pizza Hut with that roof.
@@greg3885 it better have a juke box and Galaga or some pinball inside 🍕
Pizza Crap*
@@drewwhitney7327and my mom for her random 80s custody visits.
So many weekend parents just killing time with their kids at Pizza Hut in the 80s 😂
Yes! Exactly! You nailed it. A Pizza Hut.
@@HeyBrickey wow sharing this statement shows real hurt.
Ok, I took the bait and watched your video. I was born in Torrance, CA in December 1955, so you can see my connection to Disneyland there.
At first I was thinking this guy is nothing more than a lot of yadda yadda yadda…
But I’ll admit, because I’m an adult, that I was wrong. (I’ll give myself credit for continuing to watch, though.)
Your observations, critique, and suggestions were quite good, well thought out, and I thought minus the hyperbole a lot of RUclips “critics” embrace.
Well done 👍🏼.
They've been screwing the park up for years now.
The above comment is an example of Umberto Eco's opinion on social media
@@javiercortes5232 Citing Eco in the comments thread of a Disney theme-park video. Well done.
Ha! We were just there two weeks ago, and I couldn't quite tell what was "off" about the new building. Now I know.
Thanks for sharing this.
This is the type of out of place building placement Six Flags is known for 😢
I was surprised to find that it's a gift shop--it looks like bathrooms/diaper change.
I absolutely agree with you. This is the biggest eyesore in the park. I was so disappointed when the walls came down. What were they thinking? They really failed with this one.
Exactly and After seeing stuff like this lately I worry about the quality in terms of how the avengers e ticket ride and expansion will turn out. Those better be good because if not, it’ll sting even more considering it’ll have been 10 years since the ride was originally announced back in 2019 to when it finally opens
@@mistyluvr I kept waiting for it to get better and when the walls came down I still held hope, but then they announced opening this winter and started decorating the exterior and I thought to myself “it’s not gonna get better, time to make the video 😢”
Thank you! From the beginning, this felt wrong, but I don't have the design background to understand why. I love your explanation. I look forward to seeing more of your videos.
“Friend, you failed Walt Disney’s vision.” Woah! It’s getting real, but wait, that’s how Brickey always rolls. Thanks for giving it to us straight, whether good, bad, magical, or mistake.
No one at disney even thought about the design concepts raised in this video.
With all that blank vinyl siding, it looks like they were going for the double-wide mobile home aesthetic, but they didn't quite have the budget or artistic vision to pull it off.
You’d think they could have sprung for some weathering. Nope. Just decided to let time do that.
@@bcbock You know, there are people out there that would weather it for free, or at least for a mint julep and a bag of beignets
Excellent! Your critique, not the shed. You have an amazing understanding of how Disneyland works visually and functionally.
Welp, if I get the urge to mow some park lawns, I know where to find all the equipment.
@@chitchatpaddiwack5638 😂😂😂 low key maybe the funniest comment
This epitomizes the current state of the Disney company that prioritizes profit over Walt Disney's TLC( Tender legendary care)
That’s really an eye sore. I feel like Disney world might run into these problems when they take out Tom Sawyer island and the river boat
An eyesore smack dab in front of one of their greatest attractions.
It certainly doesn't inspire confidence, I'm afraid they are going to ruin Walt Disney World's vibes
@@tomry831 I think a different division did this but yes it does rattle the confidence
What's worse is that lakes help add coolness to the surrounding area (look up "lake breeze"). When Cars goes up, the park is going to get much, much hotter.
I'm a horseman and I can tell you that whoever designed that had no idea what an actual carriage house looks like. I was trying to figure out what look they were going for, and then you said carriage house and I was literally shocked. If it is based on one, it's a style I've never seen. It's a nice building, it just doesn't seem to have any connection to the mansion at all, nor does it resemble any carriage house (especially from the mansion's era) I've seen in my studies or experience.
I was just there this morning. I HATE IT.
I can't believe Disney stooped this low. You are so right that this sticks out like a sore thumb. There is nothing of value to this building, other than indoor shopping space, but there are lots of negative effects, as you've addressed.
In model railroading this isn’t unlike putting a G-gauge building next to a HO building. Walt would have known better
Yes!!
that's basically what disneyland is,a big model train set. within it's train tracks everything should be MINIATURE versions of buildings,not full scale.
@@donkthemagicllama do you post your train builds anywhere?
Thank you for saying this. First time I saw it I thought the mansion looks so tiny. So sad. My second thought was it doesn’t match. They need to use some brown paint and make it look weathered. Or whatever it takes to make it look used. Hoping someone who matters will happen to listen to your video.
The draw to Disneyland is its human scale, the park hugs you. That’s why Galaxy’s Edge feels so off but at least it exists “outside the berm” and doesn’t clash with anything else. This building is monster.
Edit - I made this comment before I even watched the video. Bricky, you were spot on, you put into words exactly thing I was thinking.
Wow, that building has zero haunted mansion aesthetic, this is not Disney Imagineering.
The concept photo looks perfect. Wonder why the construction deviated so far from the concept photo.
because that's what Disney does nowadays, I can't remember the last time something they built actually matched the concept art.
@@cynderrrrrrrFr the only person who brings the concept art irl is Universal 😭
@LCRAVIAT1ON, that's because Disney fired a lot of their Imagineers and Universal picked them up.
@ that's cool
As someone who works on theme parks for a living, in my opinion, the simple reason this has happened is that the park itself paid for, and had this done, and Imagineering was not involved. It's really that simple.
Thanks for your quality critique. You nailed it.
So it looks like Disney has finally opened a true box store
Nah hear me out now it looks like those new ugly Crackel barrels that took out all the charm out of those restaurants into the park😂😭
Hey, just wanted to post a thank you to you and say your videos, especially this one, where you take the time to give honest artistic critiques, are great. I especially loved the moment you take to address the original designer directly to give them a "hey, I get it, sometime management messes up the original vision for management thinking" pass card. God knows we've all been there. But your feedback shows the true spirit of artist giving great, honest and useful feedback to help improve on something. Not negative just to tear it down feedback that we've become so use to, especially in the age of the internet. Its that feedback that educates and lets other artist grow in their art. Keep up the great videos and work that you're doing!
This looks like something that would be in the "western" area of a Six Flags park (specifically, it looks like something the new Cedar Fair management would build). That's fine for an amusement park focused on thrill rides and charging a fraction of Disney prices, but it looks very out of place in a theme park like Disneyland.
Exactly I’d expect to see this at great America/knotts or six flags magic mountain, not at Disneyland. Also it seems like universal is stepping up its game while Disney is barely trying at times
In this video you did a great job of showing an example of how so much of the original magic of Disneyland is gone. The magic as envisioned by Walt Disney himself. I was born a year after Disneyland first opened and throughout my childhood I spent at least one day each year at the park, often more. In High School I was friends with the son of the gal that managed the personnel department at Disneyland and by going through her office we could bypass the admission gate. I had another friend who’s first job was to work nights at Disneyland on a crew whose only job was to remove chewing gum from the roads and walkways and from under seats and tables and anywhere else people could conceivably discard their gum. Walt Disney spared no expense to keep the park pristine, it was the foundation upon which the magic was built. Whenever anything broke or appeared shabby the craftsmen responsible for that area were empowered to quickly do whatever it took to make it right. And these guys were true craftsmen and they shared Walt Disney's passion for everything being perfect. But that all changed in the mid-1980’s when Eisner took over as CEO. My brother experienced this change first hand. In the mid-1970’s my brother went to work for Ganahal Lumber, oldest lumberyard in California and, at least at that time, the largest retail lumber business in Southern California. And they were located about a mile east of Disneyland on Ball road. Ganahal did a lot of business with Disneyland, not so much on the big projects but they were the go-to place for the day to day stuff. Disneyland always had an open PO on file with Ganahal and whenever any of the craftsmen at Disneyland needed lumber or hardware for a repair they could get it at Ganahal. It would be charged to the open PO, no questions asked. Once my brother started working at Ganahal it did not take long for him to be promoted to retail sales manager and around 1980 he became the head of contractor sales, the department to which the guys from Disneyland went when they needed something. He got to know many of them and friendships developed. He saw in them the love and passion they had for their jobs, the desire they had to keep the magic alive in a manner consistent with what Walt Disney wanted. But this all changed around 1985. Disneyland management informed Ganahal that there would no longer be open POs, that for every purchase the Disneyland employee would be bringing in a PO specific to a particular project and on each PO there would be a cap on how much the employee could spend. And, probably knowing that their craftsmen would have problems adapting to the new system, the management at Disneyland warned Ganahal not to extend credit to any of their employees that came in without a PO. They told Ganahal that if they gave their people materials without first getting a PO that the payment would never come. And sure enough that is exactly what happened. The craftsmen, especially the old timers, came in as predicted, asking for materials with the promise of a PO and payment later. It was part of their DNA that when things needed repair that it had to happen before anyone noticed. To wait days, often weeks, to make a repair on something the park visitors could see was unacceptable to them and contrary to the vision Walt Disney had instilled in them. But when they had to write up a work order with cost estimates, get it approved, take bids for the materials then put in the paperwork for the PO, it took that long. And management was turning down lots of the work orders for things that clearly needed to be repaired. So as these craftsmen, people who my brother knew and considered to be friends, came in asking for materials without a PO my brother had to turn them down. Over time these guys either adapted to the new system or stopped coming in, apparently having left Disney to find work elsewhere. And for those that did continue to come in, there was a sense that their spirits were broken and that they no longer had the love and passion for their work that they had before. And at the same time I noticed changes as I continued to visit the park. One of the first things I noticed was that as the figurines of Disney characters scattered throughout the park became faded or fell into disrepair, that rather than being replaced by new versions of the origional they were either left in disrepair or replaced by painted plywood cutouts. And I started noticing that as the fascia and trim on buildings and other structures fell into disrepair it wasn't being fixed. I remember standing in the line for space mountain and noticing how bad things were getting. The line went through a long tunnel surrounded by walls made of panels backlit with blue lights. I saw that the trim around many of the panels was missing. And the holes where screws had once been were made obvious because the lights that backlit the panels showed brightly through. And as I continued to visit the park I saw the magic continue to fade. I now live in the Pacific Northwest but still share one thing in common with Disneyland: I live about a mile from I-5. But I’m also about 2 miles from the Canada border. I still make it down to SoCal every year or 2 but it’s probably been 20 years since I’ve been to Disneyland. I hear about the new rides and shows and it sounds pretty exciting. But as exciting as that all might be I would far rather go back to the simpler park of my childhood where the magic truly existed.
Spot on analysis, Brickey. I can definitely see the "love" you have in pointing out the inconsistency, without bein' a jerk about it. Well done.
I’m glad that came across, I hate making these videos but you got to keep it real.
I hadn't noticed the size issue, but you're right. And I DEFINITELY thought "this looks like a prefab shed you'd get at Home Depot".
Building is awful. Looks terrible.
I can see what the original concept art was going for... That wasn't even a carriage house, but a creole-style shoppe like the Lafitte's Blacksmith Bar or Marie Laveau's House of Voodoo in New Orleans. And that would have worked, if you kept a small scale. But instead they ended up with a giant, off-the-shelf Craftsman barn. And, well, okay... Disney has long-since stopped caring about the integrity of their parks, and there's no point to me caring more than they do. It's not like they're asking me.
Agree with you I they made us believe it would be a small marie laveou style shop but they prob wanted to push more merch at the end and this happened
Why not? They’ve ruined everything else they’ve touched in the last five years.
True story. I haven’t been to a Disney park now since 2014 and they’ve really dumbed down my beloved Epcot with characters, so I don’t ever see myself going back.
@@theshowersinger6681YES! THEY MADE A MESS OUT OF EPCOT!
@@theshowersinger6681they have been ruining California adventure too
Just looking at it on video and I want to move it out of the way, it is a major eyesore. They are so used to the whining they could care less and have gotten worse in these last years for sure.
Awesome video, Brickey! You’re completely right about how this new building doesn’t have much character. A few design tricks and some rustic-looking siding could have made a big difference. I don’t understand why they made the roof peak so tall. Thanks for sharing what many of us have been feeling but couldn’t express!
That is the ugliest green barn I’ve ever seen, and I grew up in the country.
You nailed it. The perspective is WAY off and it completely blocks the anticipation you feel when approaching the mansion from the west side. There is no contribution to considering scale here like the thought put into the Main Street buildings, or the mystique of discovering the nooks and crannies of other merch stores throughout the park. There is no good transition either. It looks like a toilet stop instead. Disney continues to make horrible choices. It's an eyesore, for sure. And who cares about a BB&B stores inside Disneyland anyway? Put that corporate business junk in California Adventure.
Thanks, you explained it perfectly, something was off visually you called it.
As with all modern Disney projects from the past few years, just put it back the way it was. How could they not visualize this? 3d design is pretty much standard now. It should have been modeled and rendered in animation.
Hey Brickey. I love your channel because you always focus on the Nexus of all the creative factors that makes Disneyland what it is. I wish they put a Tim Burton aesthetic to the building, 45° angles and like you mentioned a recessed foundation. By the way, what is that in the top window 🪟 at three minutes in? Maybe something for the future 👻 archives… Cheers bro. 😎
Disneyland totally could have made one building with two facades, one to compliment the Haunted Mansion and one to complicate Tiana’s Bayou. And it seems that it should be pushed further back in order not to detract from either attraction. It overwhelmed the site line in a negative way. What a shame. The building looks like it belongs in Downtown Disney.
It looks like a barn that someone didn’t know what color belongs on a farm.
I appreciate if it helps break the sightlines of both attractions facades from the main pathway. That area is probably the most abrupt land transition in a US Disney castle park. But I feel like they didn't read the entire assignment...
It looks like a shed I could buy from Home Depot.
I’m with you, it’s too big for the space. Blocks the view towards Tiana’s Bayou Adventure, so there’s no weenie drawing you towards that part of the park.
I think I saw that same tool shed at Home Depot down the street, must have been a good Black Friday deal
You are spot on 1000% here brother Bricky. I have been looking at this for ages trying to figure out the problem. You nailed it. Massive hulking barn misplaced that kills all the surrounding perspectives. Thanks Disney for foistering this ugliness on us. To be fair the new queue area is an improvement but there was also so much opportunity to plus it but they failed there aswell . Current Disney are spoiling the park with their cost cutting and mismanagement.
OMG. I'm so glad you covered this. I'm still shocked when Disney does non-Disney things... like using completely obvious construction walls, rather than working in a design or aesthetic that fits the theme they are covering up... and (I know I'm gonna get hate for this, but) when Disney uses the Tim Burton theming for the holidays which has always felt like nothing more than a cash grab to me. The Haunted Mansion gift shop is all of that. Not only does it NOT fit the theme, like the Pirates gift shop does, it feels like an unnecessary cash grab.
By the way, hope you get well soon Brickey. Sounds like you're dealing with a bit of congestion. I recommend Zicam highly.
Your analysis is spot on. Totally agree with you. Disney did not do their homework, went as cheap as possible or both. This is a building mistake that will cost them ten times more to fix. And they should fix it immediately.
Thank you for putting in words what my brain was seeing but couldn't voice.
It just absolutely ruins the 3:15 sight line. Used to be so perfect and beautiful and haunting (especially at night)
You could have had the same footprint for shopping but with better dimensions for theming if it was 1 building to look like 2 or more smaller buildings together.
Exactly! The could have done a much smaller (2/3 size) stone carriage house and then have a wood "addition" (additional 1/3) off the side (all connected inside) as if it was expanded at some later point. It would have created more quirky architectural interest, better scale, and more "storytelling through design."
It's like they hired a housing contractor from the suburbs.
As a fellow designer who TOTALLY understands how ops/merch/mgmt can affect a design - you are SPOT-ON with your analysis and suggestions. I really wanted this to be something special but the scale and level of detail is *terrible*.
Appreciate a fellow professional jumping in ❤️
@@HeyBrickey I'm hoping things like paint detail, propping and additional small elements can be added. But the scale is just unforgivable, and most likely a fight won by the retail folks.
The queue is really nice in terms of winding layout, lots of fun reveals and peek-throughs, and the landscaping will grow in nicely. BUT it, too, needs some more patina. And, the props look really out of scale, and very off-the-shelf. The gazing balls in particular are in contemporary colors -- they should have been mirrored mercury glass.
Hey Brickey, this was my first look at the shop. All I can do is hang my head in disappointment. Thank for taking the time to review and providing better alternatives. The one I personally like was the old church on the edge of town. Thanks again for the amazing videos you make!
We really need ppl like you back in the Disney family. You’ve captured what I’ve been thinking, when I saw it it was so lackluster and I just didn’t like it. I didn’t know why till now like this is totally right!
Super thoughtful video. Thanks for giving words to how I was feeling. I hope this video finds its way to the eyes at Disney that could make a positive change and avoid mistakes like this in the future.
I mean, the original Shipley-Leydecker house was constructed in town, so it wouldn't be so far-fetched that a carriage house would sit alongside similarly, but they'd have to reorient the "entrance" to one side (similar to what you suggested) so as to access an "alley" or "mews" next door. Totally agree that this is way too big and needs to be minimized at least visually. The overhang and its supports are overlapping the crypt exit in a weird way that adds to the oversized effect.
New Orleans Square is my favorite part of the entire park. I really do hope there's work to be done with that horrid shed thing. Thank you for weighing in with your professional eye.
This building is totally lacking in spooky or dark charm. The clashing greens are just ugly, and don’t bring the spooky. We need aged brick, ornate iron and gingerbread. It does not look like a carriage house, they were often brick.
That building has a whole lot of Walt’s Barn feel. Just saying.
Time to jack it up! Dig down deeper to drop it lower. Finish the exterior. Add the rod iron to match the mansion. Add a small cupola to the top. Redo the exterior with something other than siding from Home Depot. Right now it looks like a prefabricated storage shed. Currently it just sticks out too much and looks like a mistake.perhaps a few small gabled roof with windows set back in. Come on Disney… make Disney quality
You sum it up perfectly Brickey with constructive thoughts and deep knowledge. Just one word: BRAVO.