Students work with Disney, design entrances

Talented architecture students at UCLA may someday be responsible for developing the next impressive entrance at a Disney theme park.

With the help of world-renowned designer and UCLA architecture professor Greg Lynn and the Walt Disney Imagineering team, architecture and urban design students were able to complete their first assigned project, designing the entrances or gateways of theme parks..

“Gateway to Tomorrow,” an exhibit featuring these entrances, is being presented in the Perloff Gallery from Jan. 8 to March 19.

The exhibition is a demonstration of the students’ design accomplishments thus far in the year-long UCLA Master of Architecture II program referred to as Suprastudio ““ a year-long program in which students collaborate with both Lynn and Walt Disney Imagineering.

Walt Disney Imagineering is comprised of a professional team representing more than 140 different disciplines. The Imagineers represent the unique organization responsible for developing ideas and translating them into assembled Disney theme parks, which most of us recognize today.

Zach Riddley works in the creative development department at Walt Disney Imagineering.

“The exhibit is based on the first half of this year’s collaboration,” Riddley said.

Imagineers from all departments participate in the studio to help students overcome the architectural challenges they encounter.

“We talk with the students about our projects and the process in terms of entertainment design, and then work with the professors to craft a series of projects that are drawn from some of the issues we encounter from our design projects, that are unique to the studio,” Riddley said.

The exhibit will feature a new entrance sequence for the Epcot Park in Walt Disney World in Orlando, Florida. The Suprastudio program enrolls 12 students, all with very different backgrounds ““ most have not even personally seen a Disney park,” Riddley said. “The students are not drawing from a reference a typical person would bring who has been to a park. … They provide Disney with a fresh perspective of what a theme park could look like in the future.”

Learning to tailor their designs to accommodate crowds is another one of the challenges Suprastudio students are faced with.

“Students have been learning how you announce certain things to large audiences and give them direction and gateway ““ which has been the reason for the gateway sequence,” Riddley said.

Lynn said he feels that the public will be very interested in this exhibit. More specifically, architecture, art and design students will be curious to see how fellow university students dealt with real-world issues encountered by professionals on a daily basis.

“It’s not unprecedented, but it’s a little bit unique to be working with students and a place like Disney, and I think a lot of the themes in terms of the media and robotics is very cutting-edge,” Lynn said. “Disney is usually associated with kids. People usually dismiss Disney as (not) being innovative ““ when the fact is they are very innovative.”

“This isn’t the conclusion, it’s really the very first thing that kicked off the studio and it was also where we didn’t give the students a whole lot to respond to. We asked them more to do something that expressed what they were interested in so there’s a lot of diversity to it ““ their big civic monuments,” Lynn said.

Lynn said he feels that the partnership with the Walt Disney Imagineers is valuable because of the expertise and experience they bring to the program.

“They’re a big global corporation that thinks about the difference between working with a public in Shanghai, a public in Western Europe or in Southern California. They’re real global in a good way,” Lynn said.

Being global is the key to being a successful architect and being able to face complicated global problems and reach a successful solution by addressing every issue. The students have accomplished their first assignment by addressing all the issues the Imagineers are faced with on a regular basis, such as successfully directing large audiences.

Dumene Comploi, one of the Suprastudio students who took part in creating “Gateway to Tomorrow,” said the main inspiration of the exhibit was Mickey Mouse.

“Its influence in the contemporary pop culture can be seen not only in the street culture as in Dunnies and Munnies, but also through artists like Jeff Koons or Takashi Murakami and emergent artists like Lady Gaga,” Comploi said.

Graduate student Kagan Taylor said he never thought he’d do a studio with Disney, but was pleasantly surprised by his experience with the Magic Kingdom.

“It wasn’t my interest, but I’ve been really impressed by the level of thought and how that has managed to fit into what I am interested in,” Taylor said.