Spotlight on Sleeping Beauty Castle

In light of the last movie being in production around the time that Disneyland was being built, I decided to do an extra post about Disneyland, and about the Castle in particular.

Disneyland opened on July 17, 1955, less than a month after Lady and the Tramp was released to theaters.   Originally the castle at the gateway to Fantasyland was going to be Snow White's Castle, but it was decided that naming the castle after Sleeping Beauty (and showing it on Disney's popular new Disneyland television show) would help promote the film.  The castle is only 77 feet high, but appears larger because of forced perspective (meaning the design elements of the castle are larger and wider at the bottom than at the top).  It was inspired by the Neuschwanstein Castle in Bavaria, Germany, which was built between 1869 and 1892 by Ludwig II of Bavaria.  The Disney Parks in Paris and Hong Kong also have Sleeping Beauty Castles, though really only the Hong Kong one is modeled after the original at the Disneyland Resort in California.

Neuschwanstein Castle:

In 1957, the Sleeping Beauty Castle Walkthrough attraction opened and presented park visitors with the opportunity to see scenes from and inspired by the movie, two years before the movie even opened.

In 1977, the vignettes in the walkthrough were redesigned, this time in the style of the store windows on Main Street, with dressed and posed mannequins.  These dioramas were used until the walkthrough closed in 2001 (and remained closed until 2009, when it reopened with the original look).  One of these dioramas still exists -- in the Enchanted Chamber shop under the castle.

Another fun fact is that for the first few years the walkthrough was up, visitors received this pretty booklet as a souvenir:

The Castle's exterior is one of very few structures from Disneyland's opening day that remains more or less the same as it was nearly 60 years ago.  But the Castle does get decorated for the Christmas holiday season every year and was repainted in 2005 for the park's fiftieth anniversary celebration.  It's also the focal point for the fireworks shows the park puts on.  But most important in regards to this blog is that the Sleeping Beauty Castle logo has become the icon for Walt Disney Pictures.  In this way. even people who haven't been to Disneyland have been able to see the Castle, and that's something very special indeed.