Walt's – An American Restaurant

Walt's - An American Restaurant is a dinner place located on Main Street, U.S.A., themed to Walt Disney, the creator of the company. It is known as one the main restaurant of the resort, and specialises in table services.

Concept

When designing Euro Disneyland, Imagineers wanted to create a place which would act as a tribute to Walt Disney, since European guests were not much acquainted to his life. On Main Street, the restaurant was then built on that purpose, designed as a Victorian estate.

The Restaurant

Ground Floor

The restaurant's lobby features many items referring to Walt and his early life. Walls are adorned with photographs of his childhood in Marceline, Missouri, his family, his siblings... His bust stands in the center of the room, as long as devices from the early pre-animation era, such as a Zoetrope. A staircase and an elevator lead guests to the upper floor. As guests ascend to it, they can see photos of Walt's reach for his fame, from the creation of Mickey Mouse and the release of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs to the opening of Disneyland in Anaheim.

Upper Floor

This floor features five main rooms, each one themed to one of the park's lands :

• Fantasyland Room : This room presents an early vision of Fantasyland, and features artworks and sculptures for Disney cartoons based upon European tales. Concept-arts for the park's Castle are also visible.
• Adventureland Room : This oriental-style room features mostly Marc Davis's artworks for the ride Pirates of the Caribbean and the never-built Jungle Cruise. Others refer to Adventure Isle.
• Discoveryland Room : The room displays many drawings from some Jules Verne's books, especially Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea and From the Earth to the Moon. Other artworks present the now-gone Visionarium, with one photograph of Michel Piccoli's portrayal of Verne.
• Main Street Room : This small room features artworks for Main Street, especially photos of buildings that inspired this land's architecture.
• Frontierland Room : This library-like room bears the theme of Thunder Mesa. Here are displayed artworks of Big Thunder Mountain, Phantom Manor or Thunder Mesa Riverboats. A smaller adjacent room features references to the Grand Canyon scene visible from the Disneyland Railroad.

Trivia

• The restaurant is located on 1401, Flower Street, which is also the location of Walt Disney Imagineering in Glendale.
• Originally, the restaurant's ground floor contained three more rooms: one displaying photographs of Walt Disney and his wife, Lillian, a second one featuring artworks of Main Street, U.S.A., and a third one themed to Walt Disney's childhood. Those rooms even extended to an outside seating area on Flower Street. In 1999, they were replaced with Lilly's Boutique, a shop themed to Lillian Disney.

External Links

• Photos Magiques - Walt's, An American Restaurant Lilly's Boutique
• Disney Gazette - Walt's, An American Restaurant
• Designing Disney - Lost Treasures: Walt's Ground Floor Seating Area

References