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

GimpYancIent

Well-Known Member
They'll have two additional roof sections coming off of each side of the porte cochere, facing the oncoming and outgoing vehicle traffic, with smaller steep triangular peaks (see picture). The concept art is a straight-on view so we obviously can't see what they'll look like, but I'm hoping they'll at least have colorful open-work designs like the one on the front-facing peak. I guess we'll see...

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You know that after a few "Adult" beverages it will look just like the concept art.
 

Bocabear

Well-Known Member
I love mid-century modern. I think my issue is that this is a false gateway into mid-century Moana.
It is an upgrade to the plain timber beam and louver structure that preceded it... I am thrilled to see it getting a little love...especially if the water features return... I am just starting to recover from the Lobby destruction of a few years back...nice to see something positive...
At least it wasn't as tone-deaf as the Enchanted Rose Lounge in the Grand Floridian...lol
 

Parker in NYC

Well-Known Member
It is an upgrade to the plain timber beam and louver structure that preceded it... I am thrilled to see it getting a little love...especially if the water features return... I am just starting to recover from the Lobby destruction of a few years back...nice to see something positive...
At least it wasn't as tone-deaf as the Enchanted Rose Lounge in the Grand Floridian...lol
I just fear that these upgrades will be like cosmetic things that drive up rent prices. "We changed the entrance, that'll be another $300!" Add in the Moana re-do and... boy, do you remember when they updated things without customers paying the price? Me either.
 

Weather_Lady

Well-Known Member
I just fear that these upgrades will be like cosmetic things that drive up rent prices. "We changed the entrance, that'll be another $300!" Add in the Moana re-do and... boy, do you remember when they updated things without customers paying the price? Me either.
"There's no enhancement without [guest-funded] financement" anymore.

Maybe somebody can weigh in on what WDW's typical annual price hike is for hotel rooms. FWIW, when I checked for Value 2 season (end of August) in a standard room, the Polynesian rack rate went up 6.5% from 2020 (during refurb) to 2021 (post-refurb) -- 2 or 3 times the annual rate that the median American household's income would typically increase, but probably within the range of "Disney normal," which is something akin to the kind of "normal" that Marie Antoinette and Jeff Bezos would understand.
 

Weather_Lady

Well-Known Member
You know that after a few "Adult" beverages it will look just like the concept art.
I'd better bring them myself, because I can no longer afford multiple adult beverages at Disney pricing.

Happily, a first-rate moonshine distillery just opened on Main Street in my town (owned by a hometown hero who competed and took first place on the "Master Distiller" TV show, in fact), and I have many 3oz. bottles in which to decant the stuff to put in my 3-1-1 bag for the plane...

Seriously though, I realize the concept art is just that -- and that the Thomas Kinkade-style lighting the artist employed can't be found in the real world -- but design-wise, what they've built substantially matches the concept art so far.
 

MrPromey

Well-Known Member
And if the photos above are the actual pieces in question, all they really have to do is change the illustration a tiny bit from the object to make it different....which it appears they already have...

That's not how copyright law works.

Check out Tony Stone Pictures v. Corel, Rogers v. Koons, Mannion v. Coors Brewing Co. and their outcomes for a small sampling of examples.

Especially look at Mannion vs. Coors for just how different the original is from the copy.

There are tons and tons of other famous cases like these where the guilty party had thoughts similar to yours and lost.

A lot of it comes down to fair use as well as what can be proven with intent.

There is a case I can't recall the name of involving a horse where I believe it was a statue used as a reference for artwork where the final artwork (a painting or illustration - memory is fuzzy) was in a style that looked incredibly different. The defendant ended up losing not because their artwork looked like the original but because the plaintiff was able to find documented evidence that their copyrighted artwork was the sole reference used by the defendant in creating their own art. (intent)

Clear likeness aside (especially the oars), would you say there is any serious doubt that Disney likely used that mask and that oar, apparently both in their possession and on display in the restaurant as the reference for the artwork they put on a t-shirt advertising that restaurant?

In the case of fair use, a major component is commercial vs. non-commercial use. Had Disney been making a one-off item without intent to sell or use in marketing, even if it were to be used within one of their parks or resorts as a decorative item, they could probably still say it is a noncommercial work of art on display in a fair use argument.

Slapping it on a $30 t-shirt with intent to sell for no reason other than financial gain, clearly falls outside of the non-commercial aspect of fair use, though.

There is a fairy recent thing (recent as far as copyright law goes) where they look at if the piece in question is "transformative" but the legal use of this term is more specific to actual artistic merit and not simply design choices - the degree to which the intent is commercial vs. non-commercial would still play a role here but it becomes a sliding scale depending on the degree to which a judge considers the new art to be transformative.

Disney's artwork appears in no way to parody or provide comentary on the original artwork or provide new artistic or social meaning. Simply moving a slightly styleized version of the original artwork into a new medium is not transformative in the legal sense.

Jeff Koons has been sued a whole bunch of times all over the world for ripping off other people's stuff in pretty much this same way for what was clearly commercial purposes: selling it at really high prices for great profit. He's lost about as much as he's won but he can afford the payouts and for some reason, his reputation has not been ruined** so he doesn't appear to be losing much sleep over it.

You can argue that it shouldn't be that way or that you don't agree with it but if Oceanic Arts was pressing the issue*, Disney's lawyers would already have a good enough idea of how this would turn out to settle if it even went that far.

If this was the issue at play, unless Oceanic Arts was asking for some crazy payout, this would have ended quietly and without drama because business that do business together dealing in media run into these issues frequently and most are not looking to burn bridges with business partners but do want to protect their own interests.


*and it is reasonable that they would because despite having a website that looks like it was designed in the 90's, they appear to do a good amount of commercial work so I can't imagine Disney is the first client they've had this kind of issue with, assuming they and Disney had an issue to begin with.

**some would argue in response to Koons that you have to have a good name to begin with before it can be sullied.
 
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MrPromey

Well-Known Member
I would be shocked if Disney didn't include a full buyout of worldwide rights for any designs created by OA, including for any merchandising, when they signed the contract. They would own the copyright for the design. It's just standard when you're dealing with Disney in any capacity.

Not if they were just buying a one-off decoration for use in a single location. That would be an incredible expense for no purpose at all.

What likely happened is they bought the stuff and put it in and someone from Disney merchandising looking for inspiration went to Disneyland, took pictures and came back with great "Disney" references to draw from not realizing that wasn't original Disney art they were recreating.

I doubt it was intentional.

With an organization that big, it's easy to see how a mistake like this could happen and most designers and artists are not intimately familiar with copyright law. In fact, I'd say most are shockingly unaware (considering it's their livelyhood) for how often cases like this have come up - again, assuming that there was in fact a legal issue brought up by Oceanic Arts.
 
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MrPromey

Well-Known Member
Which is interesting because there is a brown mug with this exact same design still sitting in the gift shop. Which leads me to think this was more due to cultural issues than copyright.
View attachment 561968

The oars look a little more specific, though. It could just as easily be about them as it is about the mask or them and the mask.

Or, of course, it could have nothing to do with any of it and we're all just speculating on guesses someone made.
 

Mark48

Well-Known Member
I am looking at all this with only 1 question. Where are the stairs ? Doesn't Fire Code compliance show a need for exit stairs from the monorail level ? I don't think 1 exit INTO the building is the final design. I did note that new white steel structures went up on the
end of the platform recently . Framework for stairs ?
 

Mark48

Well-Known Member
They'll have two additional roof sections coming off of each side of the porte cochere, facing the oncoming and outgoing vehicle traffic, with smaller steep triangular peaks (see picture). The concept art is a straight-on view so we obviously can't see what they'll look like, but I'm hoping they'll at least have colorful open-work designs like the one on the front-facing peak. I agree that it's too bad that arriving guests won't get the front-ways view, but maybe the sides will have something to offer. I guess we'll see...

7743.jpg
Good point. The vast majority of guests will never see this from the front.
 

MrPromey

Well-Known Member
It's only a cultural issue if it's on a tee-shirt?

If the removal of the tee-shirts was the result of a cease-and-desist from Oceanic Arts, it's possible they were made aware of the tee-shirt and not the mug. "Hey, I saw someone at Whole Foods sporting our #428 New Guinea Mask." I doubt anyone at Disney would inform them that they were also selling a mug. Not while it was still in stock, anyway. ;)

Even assuming this is the case, it is likely this is a much less dramatic thing than everyone here thinks. Oceanic Arts appears to sell to a lot of businesses. If this resulted from a complaint from them, it's unlikely this is the first time they've had to deal with this kind of thing both from clients and other 3rd parties stealing "inspiration" off of visits to places like this or even off the images on their website.

In the case of Disney's use, it was likely a misuse by people within the organization who were not lawyers that made the mistake and it's highly possible that things never even reached a formal legal status before Disney did the "right thing" on something as minor as this.
 
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Weather_Lady

Well-Known Member
I am looking at all this with only 1 question. Where are the stairs ? Doesn't Fire Code compliance show a need for exit stairs from the monorail level ? I don't think 1 exit INTO the building is the final design. I did note that new white steel structures went up on the
end of the platform recently . Framework for stairs ?
Yes - I believe the white framework on the rear next to where the temporary scaffolding stairs are located (see below) is where a permanent staircase will go. The roofline juts out there as well, to cover it. There's a matching roof protrusion on the opposite side next to where another temporary scaffold stairs is currently placed, where a second permanent staircase will presumably be installed.

Here's the WDWMagic view of it:
Disneys-Polynesian-Resort_Full_42354.jpg



There are some other, much smaller scale white structures on the front, but these, if you look at the concept art, will become "pillars" holding up the openwork panels across the front of the station...
 
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Mark48

Well-Known Member
Yes - I believe the white framework on the rear where the temporary scaffolding stairs are located (as in the "bridge" photo above) is where a permanent staircase will go. The roofline juts out there as well, to cover it. There's a matching roof protrusion on the opposite end where another staircase might be installed.

There are some other, much smaller scale white structures on the front, but these, if you look at the concept art, will become "pillars" holding up the openwork panels across the front of the station...
Good eye.......Thank you :)
 

pdude81

Well-Known Member
When I see drilling around the lagoon, I assume test boring for a large foundation. And there has been some speculation about a polynesian dvc expansion either in the parking lot or at Spirit of Aloha in the past. Maybe they are checking out their options. Couldn't figure out how close to Spirit of Aloha the drilling truck was from the one picture I saw. Just spitballing
 

Dutch Inn '76

Well-Known Member
It's a lovely HoJo with the wrong color roof.
Looks like a harkening back to the mid-century Tiki craze - which of course inspired the construction of the Polynesian in the first place.

If it looks like a HoJos, that's because *just about everything* mid-century was influenced by the Tiki craze. It's when it got to roadside motels and bowling alleys that folks had enough of it, and (awesome) Tiki bars started to fade away.

...well, that and disco and cocaine. They had a lot to do with the death of Tiki too. :)
 

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