The brand new Disney Festival of Fantasy Parade made its debut on Sunday, March 9, 2014, in the Magic Kingdom…and you won’t be asking when the “3 o’clock parade” is, because this is one you will remember.
Doctor Disney was right there to get all the video of this new parade, and it is awesome.
Move ahead to about 2 minutes into the video for the first floats.
- Parade features a cast of more than 100
- Disney characters from more than a dozen classic stories are represented among nine parade floats
- 40 additional characters are presented in animated or sculptural form
- Performers appear on stilts, swings and pendulums, bringing a kinetic energy to the procession
- The Princess Garden lead float stretches more than 50 feet long
- The Jolly Roger atop the Peter Pan float flies 28 feet above the parade route
- Mickey’s Airship finale float is the tallest float topping out at 32 feet
- The trio of finale floats span more than 90 feet along the parade route
- Elaborate costumes are being crafted by 10 different costume houses, in eight cities, in two countries — including Creative Costuming facilities in both Florida and California.
- Some 27 separate custom designed fabrics were designed by Mirena Rada in collaboration with Creative Costuming Graphic Artist Paul Jordan.
- Counting interfacings and trims, it takes 28 separate fabrics to make up one Swing Thug #1 Costume (Tangled unit). His vest requires vinyl to be cut into 75 separate diamond shapes and then stitched onto cool max fabric.
- Some pieces, including the Seashell Girl (Little Mermaid unit) headpiece, were digitally sculpted and then grown to size with a 3D printer.
- It takes 30 yards of fabric to make one Seashell Girl costume which includes 12 different colors of Nitex Mesh.
- The coral pieces for the Coral Twins (Little Mermaid unit) were custom designed. They are being hand poured in three separate colors by the artisans of the Creative Costuming Craft Team and baked and finished for 16 hours each in an oven.
- The socks worn by the Lost Boys (Peter Pan unit) are custom designs that were knitted to order in Hong Kong.
- Minnie Mouse’s Dress and Hat (finale unit) uses 95 gold lame dots that are cut out, “blinged out,” and then sewn on.
- The Bubble Girl (finale unit) headpiece is made from three separate clown wigs that are blended together by the Creative Costuming Millinery Team.
- Cha Cha Girl (finale unit) – Her wig was designed with 148 yards of horsehair in four colors, that is then rolled, pressed and curled by hand.
- The Steampunk-inspired Maleficent Dragon stretches 53 feet from snout to tail and reaches 26 feet in the air.
- Walt Disney Parks and Resorts Creative Entertainment team members partnered with Tony Award-winning designer Michael Curry on the development of the Maleficent Dragon.
