After-Action Report: Storybook Land Canal Boats

Walt Disney loved miniatures. This interest seems to be part of a broader fascination with extremes of size that gave us Mickey Mouse’s battles against giants in “The Brave Little Tailor” and “Mickey and the Beanstalk,” the immense dinosaurs and minute pixies of Fantasia, Alice’s size-shifting escapades in Wonderland, the tiny animal sidekicks in films such as Pinocchio and Cinderella, and perhaps even Adventure Thru Inner Space. A dramatic change of scale is a dramatic change of perspective, and Walt was all about seeing the world in unconventional ways. Combine that with the delicate and nimble touch required to craft miniature models, and it's not hard to see why he loved them so much that he decided to put an entire country of them in his park.

Source Materials: A Few Excellent Moves by the Horticulture Department

Source Materials is my new label for posts about things from outside Disney theme parks that influence decisions about what to include inside the parks. For instance, I have retroactively re-classified my two-part post about heraldry in Fantasyland as a Source Materials post. There probably won't be too many of these; most of the stuff that would qualify has been gone over, extensively and in more depth than I think I would muster, by other bloggers. (Check out the sidebar for some of them!)

It's June now. What can I write about that goes well with June?

Gardening? Did I hear gardening? Gardening it is. It turns out to be a fertile* subject where Disneyland is concerned. The park's Horticulture Department is quite the unsung hero, producing magnificent work pretty much across the board, from the obvious:

to the subtle:

People certainly notice the lovely trees and garden beds throughout Disneyland, but only rarely is attention deliberately drawn toward them. It's even rarer that the specific choices made by the Horticulture Department get any focus, even though they're often brilliantly on-the-nose. Magnolia trees in New Orleans Square and edelweiss around the base of the Matterhorn are just the tip of the iceberg (lettuce).** In many cases, the appropriateness is more than just geographic.

Here are a few of my favorites.

60 Disneyland Diamonds: 1956-1965

Welcome back! Last week, I announced a new post series I'll be running here at the Disneyland Dilettante in honor of Disneyland's 60^th birthday: 60 Disneyland Diamonds for the Diamond Anniversary. So let's get the ball rolling with the first ten!