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Our guest is Architect and Theme Park Master Planner, Jeff Damron. Jeff is a 30+ year veteran of themed entertainment and destination design providing his expertise as an architect, designer and master planner in theme park projects, hotels, resorts, casinos, and many other mixed-use projects where people can live, work and play. Most recently he…
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Our guest is Tony Bruno, former VP of the Disneyland Resort Hotels & the Downtown Disney District. Under his guidance, over 4000 cast members operated The 4 Diamond Grand Californian Hotel & Disneyland Hotel – as well as the 49 unique brands that comprise Downtown Disney. Today he leads Hospitality Development at Storyland Studios helping…
JRA recently presented the session “Learning to Win by Learning How to Lose” at the 2021 IAAPA Visual Conference. The video is now available for public viewing and features over 20 industry leaders sharing their thoughts on adversity, adaptability, resilience, and hope.
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Our guest is Walt Disney Imagineering designer and art producer, Doris Hardoon. Doris joined the company for the Epcot project in 1979 helping to develop the China Pavilion. She lent her unique cultural perspective to international projects with Tokyo Disneyland and Disneyland Paris. Her crowning glory is found at Shanghai Disneyland, where she developed the…
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Our guests are two of the industry’s leading feasibility experts, the father/son duo Don and Doug Stewart of Economic Consulting Services. In the themed entertainment world, we like to think we build the impossible. But the impossible is not always feasible. The “Walt Disneys” of the world rely on experts like Don and Doug who…
One of the chapters in the upcoming park history book focuses on entrepreneurs who took Walt’s concept and found a way to make it happen in their own part of the country. These individuals had the drive, determination, resources, and sheer guts to jump head-first into waters they knew little about. Storms loomed ahead, threatening…
Everybody knows pretty much everything about Disneyland—how it got started, how the Imagineers do their thing, and so on. But nobody ever talks about the parks that most of us across the country enjoy far more often. The regional theme parks, different from amusement parks, owe their existence to the magical land Walt built in…
The last installment introduced the idea of Genius Loci and its need. Just like one will know a person by the friends they keep or what kind of tree it is by its fruit, one can trace the Genuis Loci or, Spirit of a Place by its accompanied features. How to find the Genius Loci…
So you want to build a theme park? by Peter Alexander President; Totally Fun Company What do you do? Where do you start? How about taking some cool rides, and putting them together with some good restaurants, fun stores and pretty landscaping? Well, you can do exactly that, and some people have, but if you…