Swiss Family Treehouse
| Swiss Family Treehouse | |
|---|---|
| Park | Magic Kingdom |
| Land / area | Adventureland |
| Type | Walk-through treehouse |
| Opened | October 1, 1971 |
| Designer | Walt Disney Imagineering
|
| Status | Operating |
Swiss Family Treehouse is a walk-through attraction in Adventureland at Magic Kingdom in Walt Disney World, Florida. Guests climb at their own pace through the treetop home built by the Robinson family, the shipwrecked Swiss emigrants of Disney's 1960 live-action film Swiss Family Robinson, itself adapted from Johann David Wyss's 1812 novel. There is no vehicle, no track and no narration: the story is told entirely through the furnished rooms, salvaged ship fittings and handwritten-style plaques guests pass on the stairs. It was an opening-day attraction on October 1, 1971, and remains one of the park's most unchanged original experiences.[1][2]
History
The treehouse began in California. Disneyland's version opened on November 18, 1962, in Adventureland, two years after the film's release; Imagineer Bill Martin developed the design, drawing on the treehouse created for the film.[1] The Magic Kingdom version followed as part of the Florida park's opening-day Adventureland line-up on October 1, 1971.[1][2]
The Florida tree only looks alive. It is built from steel, concrete and stucco, stands about 60 feet (18 m) tall and spreads about 90 feet (27 m) wide, and carries hundreds of thousands of fabricated leaves.[1] Imagineers jokingly classified the species as Disneyodendron eximus — an out-of-the-ordinary Disney tree. Periodic refurbishments over the decades, including work in 2021 ahead of Walt Disney World's 50th anniversary and a further closure in late 2024, have refreshed paint, props and planting without changing the route or the rooms in any fundamental way.[2]
The Disneyland original had a more complicated afterlife. It closed in March 1999 and reopened that June, on June 23, 1999, as Tarzan's Treehouse, rethemed to Disney's animated Tarzan.[3] Tarzan's Treehouse closed in September 2021, and on November 10, 2023 the California tree reopened as the Adventureland Treehouse, home to a newly invented family but explicitly inspired by the Swiss Family Robinson story that had occupied it from 1962 to 1999.[1][3]
Other versions survive abroad. Disneyland Park in Paris opened its version, La Cabane des Robinson, with the park on April 12, 1992, as the centrepiece of Adventure Isle, and Tokyo Disneyland added a Swiss Family Treehouse in 1993.[1]
Experience
Guests enter beside a stream at the base of the tree, where a waterwheel turns a system of bamboo channels and buckets that appears to lift water to the rooms above — the family's plumbing, built from salvage and ingenuity. From there a winding staircase of 116 steps climbs through the canopy.[4]
The first rooms set the premise. The living room holds furniture fashioned from wreck salvage, an organ that plays the attraction's theme, the "Swisskapolka," and the ship's wheel of the family's wrecked vessel, the Swallow. Higher up are the parents' bedroom, with a skylight and bright curtains, and opposite it the Jungle Lookout, a viewing platform whose plaque invites visitors to contemplate the family's small world; on a clear day the view takes in much of Adventureland and reaches toward Cinderella Castle and Tomorrowland.[4]
The boys' room, fitted with hammocks and bunks for Fritz, Ernst and Francis, completes the sleeping quarters. The route then descends to ground level and the kitchen and dining area, where a plaque describes a volcanic stone hearth and oven, utensils made by the family or salvaged from the wreck, and running water supplied by the wheel outside. A library and study nook, stocked with books rescued from the ship, appear along the way.[4]
Because the attraction is self-guided, guests set the pace, and the climb rewards lingering: nearly every prop, from log books and lanterns to barrels and ropework, reinforces the idea of a comfortable nineteenth-century home improvised in a jungle tree. The stairs make the attraction inaccessible to guests who cannot climb, and there is no shortcut to the lookout.
See also
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 "Swiss Family Treehouse." Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swiss_Family_Treehouse
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 "Complete Guide to Swiss Family Treehouse." WDW Prep School. https://wdwprepschool.com/swiss-family-treehouse/
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 "Swiss Family Treehouse." Yesterland. http://yesterland.com/treehouse.html
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 "Swiss Family Treehouse." The Mickey Wiki. http://themickeywiki.com/index.php?title=Swiss_Family_Treehouse&direction=next&oldid=4755&printable=yes&mobileaction=toggle_view_mobile