News Refurbishment coming soon to Disney's Polynesian Village Resort - Moana details to be included

[wdwmagic]

Here is a look at the Great Ceremonail House entrance from this week

Polynesian Village Resort Great Ceremonial House construction - August 25 2021

Polynesian Village Resort Great Ceremonial House construction - August 25 2021

www.wdwmagic.com

 

[Clamman73]

That overhead sprinkler system couldn’t be more integrated with the beams?

 

[wdwmagic]

That overhead sprinkler system couldn’t be more integrated with the beams?

I am guessing that there a ton of regulations on positioning of those things. But agree, they are a bit obtrusive.

 

[James Alucobond]

I'm still not 100% confident the underside of the roof is done. It looked to me in other pictures as though they had recently treated the underside of the walkway connecting to the main building with some sort of sprayed-on insulation or fiberglass sealant, though I may be mistaken. Of course, even if I'm not, it may be restricted only to that section of the roof.

 

[Tuvalu]

I rode the monorail through the Poly station this afternoon.

The roof underside is NOT COMPLETED. There is still much work to be done on the platform and the entire area underneath it. All of you critics need to wait until this project is finished before any complaints can be justifiable.

I also walked the resort grounds. At least one longhouse (Rarotonga) is still closed for refurbishment (active work going on.) Moorea (DVC longhouse) is closed and possibly Pago Pago (some windows had the construction paper over them, others did not.)

According to a long term (33 years) Poly CM, the goal is to have the resort (non-DVC part) fully operational by Oct 1.

 

[lazyboy97o]

I am guessing that there a ton of regulations on positioning of those things. But agree, they are a bit obtrusive.

The regulations make a lot of options available.

The roof underside is NOT COMPLETED. There is still much work to be done on the platform and the entire area underneath it. All of you critics need to wait until this project is finished before any complaints can be justifiable.

Some of us know how things get built.

 

[Animaniac93-98]

"What makes Aulani very different is that it's not necessarily about telling a Disney story, the main story there is the Hawaiian culture."

"...a story not of Mickey and Minnie, even though, you know, they're there, but the story of Aulani"

"We can tell the story in a very subtle way, but if you look for it, it's there"

^ all quotes from the Disneyland Hotel episode of Behind the Attraction that was uploaded yesterday, which also talks about Poly's history.

It's bizarre that so much of Disney's hotel history and success is not defined by IP, and that's somehow still known, but then they decide to plaster characters everywhere with each update they do.

 

[James Alucobond]

"What makes Aulani very different is that it's not necessarily about telling a Disney story, the main story there is the Hawaiian culture."

"...a story not of Mickey and Minnie, even though, you know, they're there, but the story of Aulani"

"We can tell the story in a very subtle way, but if you look for it, it's there"

^ all quotes from the Disneyland Hotel episode of Behind the Attraction that was uploaded yesterday, which also talks about Poly's history.

It's bizarre that so much of Disney's hotel history and success is not defined by IP, and that's somehow still known, but then they decide to plaster characters everywhere with each update they do.

To be fair, they do also mention not wanting the park experience to end and the Contemporary and Polynesian as explicit extensions of Tomorrowland and Adventureland, respectively. One could see why they might want to extend IP into the hotels as IP is entrenched ever more deeply in the parks themselves. Not that we have to agree with that direction, but I don't find it particularly contradictory. I feel their statements about sightlines across multiple episodes (with reference to seeing the Contemporary from inside Tomorrowland mentioned in this episode specifically) are among the most incongruous with the current reality given the way some of the new attractions are turning out.

 

[castlecake2.0]

Aulani and the Polynesian are very different things, one is meant to transport you to a different time and place, the other is meant to highlight the time and place you are in.

 

[CuteAsMinnie]

I rode the monorail through the Poly station this afternoon.

The roof underside is NOT COMPLETED. There is still much work to be done on the platform and the entire area underneath it. All of you critics need to wait until this project is finished before any complaints can be justifiable.

I also walked the resort grounds. At least two longhouses (Hawaii and Rarotonga) are still closed for refurbishment (active work going on.) Moorea (DVC longhouse) is closed and possibly Pago Pago (some windows had the construction paper over them, others did not.)

According to a long term (33 years) Poly CM, the goal is to have the resort (non-DVC part) fully operational by Oct 1.

HI longhouse is NOT closed and has been open for a few weeks. We stayed in HI longhouse last week. The CL lounge remains closed, however for the next few months,
at least.
Pago Pago is the first DVC longhouse to be undergoing the soft refurb and Moorea is at least partially still closed.

 

[Sir_Cliff]

I think what gets me more than the roof here is that the only effort made to make the beams and columns look like wood has been just to paint them brown. Maybe from a distance the effect is fine, but close up it's obvious it's all just metal and concrete painted brown.

AKL or Wilderness Lodge present really stark contrasts, with WL for example really going the extra mile to make the porte cochere look like a believable wooden structure in terms of not just its texture, but how it's all put together:

You don't even really have to get up that close to see the Polynesian is a whole different level of quality:

 

[Bocabear]

But Wilderness Lodge and AKL were built in a different time under a different leadership...One that understood that the Hotels themselves were an IP...not a canvas to broadcast characters onto...they were the attraction themselves. I always felt that the theming of the hotels themselves was an extension of the parks stories...I didn''t need to have someone literally put Cinderella in my room... It all felt magical all on it's own. Adding the characters into the rooms to me feels like a 192 off property motel saying "See we are Disney Too! Look at the characters"... You don't need that when you are literally on the WDW property.

 

[Skywise]

But Wilderness Lodge and AKL were built in a different time under a different leadership...One that understood that the Hotels themselves were an IP...not a canvas to broadcast characters onto...they were the attraction themselves. I always felt that the theming of the hotels themselves was an extension of the parks stories...I didn''t need to have someone literally put Cinderella in my room... It all felt magical all on it's own. Adding the characters into the rooms to me feels like a 192 off property motel saying "See we are Disney Too! Look at the characters"... You don't need that when you are literally on the WDW property.

Right - I don't need a "Fathead"(tm) of Moana on my room wall to make me feel like I'm living on the same island as Moana - Beaches, lush tropical gardens and flowing water will do nicely to make me think I'm in a place where I could MEET Moana.

The latter is experiential and value adding - the former is cheap marketing like customized coke cans.

 

[James Alucobond]

The lava rock waterfalls seem to have returned as a feature of the entrance as of today. Perhaps even more substantial than before, though my memory of them is slightly fuzzy at this point. Still difficult to discern the scope of the actual pools they flow into from the photos.

 

[nickys]

I rode the monorail through the Poly station this afternoon.

The roof underside is NOT COMPLETED. There is still much work to be done on the platform and the entire area underneath it. All of you critics need to wait until this project is finished before any complaints can be justifiable.

I also walked the resort grounds. At least one longhouse (Rarotonga) is still closed for refurbishment (active work going on.) Moorea (DVC longhouse) is closed and possibly Pago Pago (some windows had the construction paper over them, others did not.)

According to a long term (33 years) Poly CM, the goal is to have the resort (non-DVC part) fully operational by Oct 1.

Somehow I’d missed the fact that they are overlapping the work on the non-DVC and DVC longhouses.

I believe at least some rooms at Pago Pago are complete, the first pictures are coming out from people staying in the newly refurbed DVC studios. Very interesting to me is that during a soft goods refurb of the DVC studios they are replacing the sofa beds with the queen size Murphy wall beds. Still waiting for an actual room tour video to be posted somewhere.

 

[tired_photog]

I think what gets me more than the roof here is that the only effort made to make the beams and columns look like wood has been just to paint them brown. Maybe from a distance the effect is fine, but close up it's obvious it's all just metal and concrete painted brown.

AKL or Wilderness Lodge present really stark contrasts, with WL for example really going the extra mile to make the porte cochere look like a believable wooden structure in terms of not just its texture, but how it's all put together:

View attachment 582871

View attachment 582872

You don't even really have to get up that close to see the Polynesian is a whole different level of quality:

The concept art even shows “wood” details on the columns. Either this detailing is still to come or was axed in the final concept.

 

[Jdn0018]

Here's a couple posts with photos from the refreshed DVC rooms in Pago Pago.

 

[castlecake2.0]

Here's a couple posts with photos from the refreshed DVC rooms in Pago Pago.

Interesting that this is almost completely lacks IP

 

[nickys]

Interesting that this is almost completely lacks IP

It’s a timeshare so they tend to keep the IP touches subtle. Luckily.

 

[pdude81]

Somehow I’d missed the fact that they are overlapping the work on the non-DVC and DVC longhouses.

I believe at least some rooms at Pago Pago are complete, the first pictures are coming out from people staying in the newly refurbed DVC studios. Very interesting to me is that during a soft goods refurb of the DVC studios they are replacing the sofa beds with the queen size Murphy wall beds. Still waiting for an actual room tour video to be posted somewhere.

Those sofa beds are their own maintenance issue though. I've heard that they had trouble keeping up with parts and repairs on the sleeper sofas at SSR and sometimes had an issue keeping enough rooms in service when people needed to use those as beds. They have to be replaced/repaired as they go down, so it makes sense at a certain point to move all of these to the beds with lower maintenance and higher guest satisfaction. Not cheap of course, but If you're in there tearing up the floors and doing other work anyway it makes sense. I'm curious to know over the generic 7 year periods what the overall cost difference is, and how often on average would they have to replace a sleeper sofa in a given unit anyway