Skies

This time I will focus my post not on the buildings, the theming, the details of Disneyland Paris, but on one of the rarest and most beautiful sights over there: the blue sky. Can you believe that in 10 years of trips to Disneyland Paris this is the FIRST time I happened to enjoy a blue sky (sometimes with sparse clouds wich made it even more enchanting) for the whole stay, that's three days in a row! Enjoy.

Details details details

Disneyland Paris nevese ceases to surprise me. Look at the intricated work I found right after the entrance, to the left of Town Square, just right in front of the restrooms. Simly amazing.

Candy galore

There no Sunday morning stroll on Main Street U.S.A. without a visit to the Candy Palace to grab some candies to survive the walk to Sleeping Beauty's Castles. Those of you who follow this blog since its launch will probably remember my fond love for this store on Disneyland Paris' Main Street and my concerns when I first heard it was going to be refurbished slighly more than a year ago. My friend at "Sparkling Castle" blog visited the new shop a few months after its reopening and said quite good things about it, yet I was scared. Well, now I saw with my own very eyes and can fully agree with him! The color scheme is ligher and fluffier without being corny and cheesy. The ceiling now features a wallaper looking like a pink and white striped tent wich looks really fresh and elegant at the same time. And now, for you to enjoy, some of my pictures of this place. Too bad you can't smell the vanilla fudge perfume pervading this place...

Back from Disneyland, ready to post

Less than a week ago, I was enjoying my time at the Disneyland Resort Paris, where I spent four full magical days. That basically means one hugely good thing for this blog: I have tons of new pictures to share with you! Everything was magic as usual there but the biggest surprise was the weather wich, for the first time in my experience of Disneyland Paris, was incredibly mild and pleasant, with clear blue skies dotted by innocent clouds, a sparkling breeze and that cuddling warmth it just makes you feel happy to be alive. So... Ready, set, go!

You should all now bu now I really love Main Street U.S.A. and always start my visit with a nice and quiet stroll, taking my time to listen to the music, watch the beautiful buildings and wonder at those beautiful little details. Like this sign on the Main Street Transport Deposit...



...or these intricated wood swirls gracing the waiting area in front of the restrooms...


And what about the American flag framed by the colums of the Emporium?


or the entrance to the Liberty Arcade?


Oh by the way, I live here...


and that's where I usually have my cup of coffee in the morning (sigh!)

Let's all visit the Sparkling Castle

I just wanted to suggest you a brand new blog that just opened today: it's called Sparkling Castle and it belongs to one of the most talented drawers I know. He's a huge disney theme park and animation fan and he's so talented that if he likes an animated movie and would love to enjoy the never built dark ride inspired by it, he just picks up a pencil and draws it. Or if he's unsatisfied with the average quality of the Disneyland Paris souvenirs, he just designs new ones just for himself. Take a look at his artwork and judge for yourself.

Time for some window sightseeing

First, please all welcome Isabel Girão and John Rozum, Town Square Photography's new followers. Thanks Isabel and John: hope to keep up to your expectations!
Let then move to this post's subject: the wonderful windows of Main Stree U.S.A.! One of the most underrated yet most delightful features of Main Street U.S.A., the windows of Main Street feature wondeful designs and shapes and incredibly detailed decorations. The rushing-to-nowhere kind of guests will probably not even realise there's actually something to enjoy not at eye-level, so let's just have pity of them and move on :-) Instead, take-your-time kind of guests, like we are, will grab some rice crispies treats at the candy store then raise their eyes and not only enjoy the incredibly detailed designs but also learn something new about the people who made this park a reality.

Like Michael Eisner and Frank Wells who joined the company in 1984 (just the perfect time to translate with ease in turn-of-the-century Main Street)...


...or Robert Fitzpatrick, chairman of the Euro Disney Resort until 1993, well known for his famous reply to French intellectuals speaking out against american colonisation of the French culture ("We didn’t come in and say O.K., we’re going to put a beret and a baguette on Mickey Mouse. We are who we are) wich backfired in almost no time in titles on the newspaper saying Americans see French as the lousiest stereotype".



One apologie: sometimes my English is fine, sometimes it just sucks. This time sucked. Please have mercy of it today. Mamma mia!

Fantasyland Theatre

There's an insisting rumor that the Fantasyland Theatre in Fantasyland at Disneyland Paris will be bulldozed in the following years to make way to the European version of Disney's Calfornia Adventure's "The Little Mermaid" ride wich is rumored to be of the best ride WDI ever designed. The Fantasyland Theatre is a lovely building made of bricks, glass and steel and even though it was definitely not used as much as planned, if rumors prove true and the building will be demolished, I will surely miss it. That said, I building and attractions won rewards based on the numers of pictures taken of it, Famtasyland Theatre would be cursed: here are the only two pictures I found in more that ten trip to Disneyland Resort Paris.


This last one, taken on a foggy winter day, is from the right side, close to Alice's Curious Labyrinth and you can see the Fantasyland station on top of the theatre building. I'm surely going to take some more pictures of it next May.

Two months to go!

Just wanted to let you know that in two month now I'll be probably strolling somewhere along Main Street U.S.A. or exploring the hidden tracks around the Temple of Doom or waiting to get my ride to Endor or diggin' some gold under the shadow of Big Thunder Mountain. In the meantime, let's take a stroll down memory lane with this detail of Space Mountain when it used to take guests to the Moon, not to some 70's disco club.

Disney relief for the weekend

Just survived from an hectic week in Milan, and in so much need of some disney magic! Here are some soothing images for you (am me!) to savour fpr the weekend.

Some Beautiful rock formations on the side of the castle. Would pay to climb them!


Castle balconies. A little bit rotten and in need of some maintenance, but you know what? Most real castle are like that so I quite like the final look (just won't say it too loud so suits won't find a cheap excuse to cut on maintenance...)


And the grand finale: the cozy outdoor area of L'Auberge de Cendrillon restaurant. Just so sad it's almost never used because of the rainy parisian weather!

Good Ol' Main Street

Having a look at these pictures of mine taken on my 2002 holiday is so weird... They do look older and a little less carefully planned as the ones I took in the following years. You all know Main Street USA is my favorite land and I have tons and tons of pictures of its wonderful buildings. Nevertheless each time I take a picture of just one of them I always discover new things: take this pictures for instance: look at the details, and at the face painted on te brickwall. Wonderful.

Ten years after the crowds turned to nonexistant to quite obnoxious while the sky is still tuned to parisian grey!

Walt Disney Studios

During the last months, I had some time to scan an upload tons of older pictures from my previous trips to Disneyland Paris, like these ones I took back in 2002 when Walt Disney Studios had just opened. The park itself was the scary joke we all know, but the entrance to the park, especially at night had its own charme. Take a look and judge for yourself.

to Disneyland Paris... and beyond!

Dear readers all,
it's been quite a long time since my last post. You all can easily guess what happened: real life took over and finding a little bit of time to post became harder and harder. I kept checking the stats about Town Square Photography though and found, to my greatest surprise, that the site is still visited every single day by people from all over the world still looking for pictures and thoughts about Disneyland Paris (basically). I even got two regular readers (hello Pricess Fee! Hello Dew!).
Well, here's the good news: after a long hiatus (life took its toll, as I said before), I'll be visiting Disneyland Paris in May, arriving on the 10th and leaving the 14th! I'm really looking forward to being strolling along Main Street and wander through Adventureland. In the following days I'll keep you updated as the vacation schedule more and more precise! So, stay tuned!
Massimo

Some more fuzzy shots

Casual Pictures

Sometimes you plan a shot, measure distances, balance negative spaces, keep your breath and shoot the picture... and end with a bland, anonimous, boring image. Other times you just push the button and something magic happens. Here are a few pictures: they're not focused, they're zoomed in with no logic at all... but they managed to capture the essence of those moments, the magic of those nights at the park.

New graphics!

Hi all! I am very proud to announce that I finally managed to give this blog a brand new, boldly daring, joyfully retro, warmly welcoming, cover picture! I'm so proud of it!
In my opinion, it's just a perfect balance between a 50's look and a Main Street look. My appreciation goes to the artists at Late Rabbits (close friends of mine) who managed to get through my confusional briefs!

Euro Disney Resort

We all know the troubled first years of Disneyland Resort Paris, and how they changed the name of the resort from Euro Disney Resort to Disneyland Paris in an effort to get rid of all the bad press associated to the Euro Disney brand. A few years ago, while enjoying a walk along the shores of Lake Disney, I discovered a lamp pole with the long gone "Euro Disney Resort" log on it and thought that after all that name was not bad at all. Your thoughts?

Can't get enought of that stuff!

No, I'm not talking about Duff Beer, of course! It's Disneyland Paris' wondrous Chateau I'm talking about: here are two twilight pictures, just perfect, just wonderful. When I look at these pictures, that's when I excuse Michael Eisner for giving the green light to have Europe's Disneyland build in the rainest spot in all France ;-)

Simple but true

After the sad realisation that Disneyland's Tomorrowland is in such a bad shape, I turned my interest on the Walt Disney Studios at Disneyland Resort Paris again, wich, after my visit to Disney's California Adventure, I think does not deserve the Disney's-all-time-worst rate it got when it first opened. Just to see if what I was thinking was supported by actual evidences, I watched my pics of Crush's Coaster and thought that, true, it's not Disneyland Paris we're talking here, but it's still nice, and true to its heart, with no presumption of being the best, as Disney's California Adventure. Take a look at the pictures and judge for yourself.

Someone save the Future!

Disneyland in California has such unique places and feelings to offer it can really stand beside Disneyland Paris (and sometimes even beat it, but don't say to loud...) Of course, there's always an exception and in this case it's the sad sad land which is know as the land of tomorrow: Tomorrowland.

Forget the charming streets of New Orleans Square, long gone are the good feelings of Main Street: of all the lands of Disneyland, Tomorrowland is the worst of them all, such an all-time-worst even Walt Disney Studios in Paris can claim it offers better theming (I never thought I would say it!). We always thought Walt Disney Studios stood as the quintessential evil in Disney entertainment, well think again: Disneyland's Tomorrowland is your new enemy.

Ok, I'm used to Discoveryland, with its strong and cohesive identity, and ok, we all know the hard time Imagineers (and not just them) had and still have in representing realistic tomorrows (have a look a Paleo-future to get what I mean), but Tomorrowland has no excuses: it's just an area of the park that has been left abandoned for years (at least that's what it seems). I tried to get a picture of it, I looked for a nice point of view, for a "contemporary" look to take a picture of... nothing.

There's an exception to the exception of course: Space Mountain, wich beats Disneyland Paris' completely: it's less bumpy, more colorful, much better themed, with sights and sounds blending just perfectly into each other, and most of all it can be be ridden even by people who would never ride our Space "Washing Machine" Mountain, wich is what Disneyland is all about: having fun all together.

I liked the (recently redone) interior of Space Mountain. It goes full speed in the direction of representing a good ol', naive, future. Much much better than the sad, inconsistent, disjointed representation going on elsewhere on this area.

Main Street Anaheim

So I finally made it: after so many years visiting "the prettiest copy of them all", always wondering what the original was like, I finally happened to look at th 50 years old castle, wander through the narrow streets of New Orleans Square and take a stroll on Main Street. My rate? This park is a gem, a true work of art, full of warmth, kindness, delicaties. Nothing is overstated, nothing screamed, everything, every building rather than stating its presence first say hello, then kindly introduce itself. Take for example, Main Street U.S.A.

Compared to the Disneyland Paris version, the building here are less decorated, less higher (at least they seem to), less flamboyant in colors. Some would say the only difference is a tighter budget, I would say it's much more. Disneyland's Main Street is still a town street, less urban, much more close to an ideal, to a dreamed place, slightly smaller than reality, weirdly easier to grab. Don't know if it was all made on purpose or if it was the a genius ingenuity that had it made this way... still Disneyland Main Street U.S.A. has a heart no other Main Street has.

Take a stroll, judge by yourself... and don't forget to grab an ice cream with you!