Norway Pavilion
| Norway Pavilion | |
|---|---|
| Park | EPCOT |
| Land / area | World Showcase |
| Type | Pavilion |
| Opened | June 3, 1988
|
| Status | Operating |
The Norway Pavilion is a pavilion in World Showcase at EPCOT at Walt Disney World, Florida, situated between the Mexico Pavilion and the China Pavilion. Dedicated on June 3, 1988, it is the most recent national pavilion added to World Showcase and, to date, the last. The 58,000-square-foot (5,400 m²) pavilion is laid out as a Norwegian village square, combining buildings in several regional styles around a replica stave church.
Norway was not part of the opening-day lineup. A Scandinavian presence had been discussed for World Showcase in various forms before a specifically Norwegian pavilion, backed by Norwegian investors, went ahead in the mid-1980s. The pavilion soft-opened on May 6, 1988, and was formally dedicated a month later by Crown Prince Harald of Norway — later King Harald V — in a ceremony broadcast live in Norway. Its boat ride, Maelstrom, followed on July 5, 1988.
Design
The pavilion deliberately samples architecture from across Norway rather than copying a single town. Sources commonly identified in its buildings include Setesdal, Bergen, Oslo and Ålesund styles: timber houses with sod and slate roofs, a Bergen waterfront row, and a stone fortress-like block whose exterior echoes Akershus Fortress in Oslo and fronts the pavilion's restaurant.
The centrepiece is the Stave Church Gallery, a roughly four-fifths-scale reproduction of the Gol stave church, a thirteenth-century wooden church now preserved at the Norwegian Museum of Cultural History in Oslo. A statue of Saint Olaf (Olaf II Haraldsson) stands before it. Inside, the church has housed a sequence of exhibitions on Norwegian history and culture; its current display, Gods of the Vikings, covers figures from Norse mythology.
Attractions
The pavilion's ride has occupied the same show building and flume since 1988. Maelstrom, which operated from July 5, 1988 to October 5, 2014, carried visitors in Viking-styled boats through scenes of Norwegian folklore and history — including an encounter with trolls that sent boats backwards — before a drop and a passage past a North Sea oil rig brought them to a short film about modern Norway. It is often described as EPCOT's first thrill ride.
Following the success of the animated film Frozen (2013), whose fictional Arendelle drew heavily on Norwegian scenery and architecture, Disney announced in September 2014 that Maelstrom would be converted. Frozen Ever After opened on June 21, 2016, reusing the boats and essentially the same course. The ride now stages a summer snow day in Arendelle, with Audio-Animatronic figures of Anna, Elsa, Olaf, Kristoff and others, and culminates in Elsa's ice palace. An announced upgrade to the figures, using projection technology from the World of Frozen land at Hong Kong Disneyland, was scheduled for completion in February 2026.
Next to the ride, Anna and Elsa at Royal Sommerhus', a character meeting location styled as a summer cabin, also opened on June 21, 2016. An earlier exhibition in the stave church, Norsk Kultur, displayed objects that had inspired Frozens designers.
Dining and shopping
Akershus Royal Banquet Hall is the pavilion's table-service restaurant, serving Norwegian-influenced food; since 2005 it has operated largely as a character dining location with Disney princesses. Kringla Bakeri Og Kafe is a quick-service bakery known for sweet pastries including skolebrød, a custard-filled bun. The pavilion's shops, long arranged as a linked series including The Puffin's Roost and The Fjording, sell Norwegian clothing, trolls, and Frozen merchandise, a balance that has shifted noticeably toward the film since 2016.