Walt Disney World to Open Art of Animation Resort May 31, 2012

- Michelle Snow

It’s been a while since Walt Disney World opened a new resort on property. The last completely new resort was Pop Century back in 2003.

There was supposed to be a companion resort that covered the first half of Disney’s history by the decades, but it never came to fruition and the shell of the resort lay dormant until Disney’s imagineers got the bright idea to turn it into a value resort comprising mostly of family suites.

As with the other value properties, Disney’s Art of Animation resort has blocks of rooms, known as wings, and each of these wings have specific themes to the decor. The resort has three family suite wings, themed after the movies Finding Nemo, Lion King, and Cars. The fourth and final wing is made up of standard rooms and is themed after The Little Mermaid.

Image courtesy of Walt Disney World

Each wing’s decor includes interior theming to the respective films. In the Finding Nemo wing, there are coral-shaped chairs and bubble ceiling lights. In The Lion King wing, Zazu features in the headboard design and Pumbaa and Timon are on the shower curtain.

The themed decor extends outdoors, where the Cars wing looks like the movie’s Cozy Cone Motel, and a 35-ft tall statue of King Triton decorates the Little Mermaid wing.

Amenities of the resort include the “Big Blue” pool, the largest one of any of the property’s resorts. There is also a children’s water play area, an arcade and two additional pools at the resort.

The Landscape of Flavors food court will feature menu items ranging from the regular burgers and fries to Mongolian barbecue and hand-scooped gelato.

There are 1,120 family suites total that sleep up to six. In addition, they feature kitchenettes and two bathrooms. Rack rates for the suites start at $248 per night. The standard wing will feature 864 regular rooms that sleep four, with rates that start at $94 a night. All resort guests receive Disney benefits like complimentary transportation to the parks and access to the Extra Magic Hours, which allow guests private access to the theme parks on a daily rotating basis.

For more information or to book one of the family suites, which will open in segments starting on May 31, 2012, call 407-WDISNEY.

Image courtesy of Walt Disney World

About Michelle Snow

Michelle is the owner and editor of CitySurfing Orlando. She also owns Zengrrl.com, is a freelance writer specializing in travel and entertainment, has authored/co-authored four guidebooks on Orlando and Florida, and was head editor/writer at TheDisneyBlog.com for 10 years. She's lived in Orlando near Walt Disney World since 1995, and still finds there's so much fun to be had in Central Florida.
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