News New Polynesian Resort DVC villas building to open 2024

[Chef idea Mickey`=]

You need to spend a bit more time at Riviera. The grounds, rooms and food locations are quite evocative. But I did qualify my post with ‘nice’ for a reason. It is themed, but apparently not enough for many tastes. Had the massing been better pulled off I don’t think there would even be much debate left.

Also you need to broaden your comparisons beyond Marriott, it’s not even accurate. There’s no ambiguity that Poly Island Tower and Riviera can be mistaken for one another. So why accuse them all of being Marriotts.

I think this resort can be seen both ways. It's star shine shelf is at night, in day it evokes as just Disney-inspired rather than setting off that you are somewhere. That isn't the case how it looks at night to me.

 

[Casper Gutman]

I will say that Riveras's quick service downstairs is probably in the top 3 QSR's in all of WDW. It's only downfall was that it was freezing in there! In MAY!

The QS is excellent and the grounds of the Riviera are beautiful and quite nicely themed. The BUILDING, however, is a mess inside and out. It fails to evoke any kind of theme at all - even the pictures in the hall are all over the place thematically.

 

[mattpeto]

At least from the original art work, the exterior somehow is a downgrade for me.

That was a pretty low bar.

 

[John park hopper]

Man that is a waste of existence to hope to live long enough to see something primarily fail. Surely you value more things than hate watching.

Has nothing to do with hate just a figure of speech. Point being not one new resort in years but they can build DVC in lightning speed

 

[TheCoasterNerd]

As someone who just got back from a week on Oahu, and visited the Polynesian Cultural Center along the way, this looks great! Very fitting if they're going for a modern Polynesian look. I don't understand the hate, it looks nice. And it looks better than half the "luxury hotels" in Hawai'i.

 

[rle4lunch]

The QS is excellent and the grounds of the Riviera are beautiful and quite nicely themed. The BUILDING, however, is a mess inside and out. It fails to evoke any kind of theme at all - even the pictures in the hall are all over the place thematically.

We stayed there once to get it off our DVC bucket list of trying each resort. It was very nice, clean, etc. But it also felt really sterile and thematically hollow.

 

[Epcot82Guy]

They’re really not. The Island Tower started as an HHCP project but I believe this final iteration ended up with HKS, who also did Destino and Riviera. Reflections, now Lakeshore Lodge, is a WATG project. Gensler did do the Swan Reserve, but that wasn’t actually a Disney project. So even if they did do the Island Tower that’s only one of these recent hotels.

Ah - my apologies. I understood Gensler was Disney's primary partner for DVC at this point. I knew the did Swan Reserve. And, you are right - it's Disney "approved" by that relationship, but actually a Marriott (Tishman still?) project.

Thanks for the clarification!

 

[Casper Gutman]

We stayed there once to get it off our DVC bucket list of trying each resort. It was very nice, clean, etc. But it also felt really sterile and thematically hollow.

I used to try and stay at every Disney resort at least once but, after Art of Animation, the new hotels were so utterly soulless there wasn’t any point anymore. Fortunately (?), that’s also when rates began to become insanely expensive, so it all worked out!

Posters defending this by likening it to modern island hotels seem to be missing the entire point of a Disney resort (just like Disney!) The Lodges, Floridian, Port Orleans, the original Polynesian - these were FANTASIES. They didn’t look or feel like any other resorts anywhere else in the world. Where’s the fun in paying gobs of cash to stay in a hotel with the same subdued, minimalist aesthetic found in any other upscale hotel? We used to get public spaces like those found at the Wilderness or pre-refurb Orleans, now we get subtle wave motifs.

 

[Tha Realest]

Ah - my apologies. I understood Gensler was Disney's primary partner for DVC at this point. I knew the did Swan Reserve. And, you are right - it's Disney "approved" by that relationship, but actually a Marriott (Tishman still?) project.

Thanks for the clarification!

Gensler and WDI have been engaged in an unofficial exchange program. Until very recently, WDI’s president was a longtime Gensler employee. Whether they are the contractor on a particular project is irrelevant - their soulless corporate inoffensive design choices, desaturated of any color or whimsy, are all over many major projects over the last few years.