Known worldwide as Disney Imagineers, those who have worked for WED Enterprises have had a front-row experience to Disney’s magic. But beyond that, they are the ones who have had a direct hand in building that magic. It’s a unique role and experience working in a company founded and run by Walt Disney to innovate and create magic moments.
At Visioneering Studios, our sister company the CEO, John Parker, had that unique opportunity to call himself an Imagineer. He helped build some of the most recognizable attractions in Disney’s California Adventure, including Soarin’ Over California. From that time, he learned ten invaluable lessons that he has instilled in the culture and mission of Visioneering Studios.
Brand-telling
At Disney, they have a great history of beloved intellectual property that they use to create immersive story environments. When carried over into businesses and churches, this same principle is called brand-telling. It’s essential when designing a space to incorporate brand-telling so that the space complements their brand and communicates it to everyone who experiences it. Creating a branded environment is about sharing your organization’s ethos while showcasing its unique place in the world.
Humanizing Design
Great design isn’t just about making the most beautiful building but also designing a space that understands your audience or customer. It’s asking who they are, their needs, and their desires – taking all of those things into account when creating the space. For example, when designing a children’s area, you have to ask what will be fun for the child and build trust for their parents.
Create Emotion
When Disney’s California Adventure opened, the front entrance was designed to be a “giant postcard” of California. The problem was guests had no emotional connection with these postcard places. So 10 years later, they had to re-imagine the main entrance into Buena Vista Street, a representation of Los Angeles as Walt would have experienced it in the 1920s. For churches, if your vision is about changing lives, service, and missions, shouldn’t your space help tell that same story by creating an emotional connection to those values?
User Experience
Close your eyes and picture Disneyland. Did you imagine Main Street? Cinderella’s Castle? Or maybe even Tomorrowland? Disneyland was designed around these destinations so that each land would transport the guest to a new world. At the center of that plan is something called the Hub. If you stand next to Walt and Mickey’s statue, you can look into each of the lands and know where you are going. This clear and defined design drives the guests’ experience of the park and, when brought into the design process for your church, will help guests and members feel at home and comfortable navigating your space.
Way-finding and Signage
A positive guest experience, often built out of the previous lesson, starts with good way-finding and signage. Just imagine for a second that all of your ushers or greeters didn’t show up one weekend. What would the end result be? Would parents be wondering about the hallways looking for Kid’s Ministry? Would sleepy-eyed college students be bumping into the walls looking for coffee? Putting your people first, understanding their needs, and then designing to those needs through convenient things like good way-finding will go far in helping them enjoy the space.
Programing
Budget-Savvy™ Guarantee
Even Imagineers do not have an unlimited budget when designing their parks. In fact, Walt Disney World can even be said to have been made on a “lean” budget. But good design, when paired with excellent design principles and an understanding of how to implement them, will lead to solutions that go above and beyond what you may have even thought was possible.
