200,000 Lights Transform Cinderella Castle at Walt Disney World

[eeyoreguy]

Really nice little article over at the DisneyParks Blog about how Cinderella's castle transforms into its Christmas outfit. Click the link and watch the video!

200,000 Lights Transform Cinderella Castle at Walt Disney World Disney Parks Blog

“Dipped in sugar” is how Cinderella Castle appears to Walt Disney World Entertainment’s senior show director Alan Bruun. And if you’ve seen the castle’s 200,000 holiday lights, it’s hard to disagree with the description — it’s a must see.

But how the Castle transforms for the season is just as remarkable. It takes about six weeks and involves hundreds of hours of manpower. Cranes are brought in overnight to place the LED lights around the castle and reach the highest spires. Here’s video showing some of the behind-the-scenes work that goes into lighting the Castle each year

The Castle lights are also attached to more than 40,000 square feet of fisherman’s net dyed to specifically match the colors of the castle. There is blue net for the roof tops and gray for the walls. After the lights are hooked up on the nets, they’re programmed and tested and then written into lighting cues for the shows, according to Bruun.

To bring the lights together, 18 miles of electrical cable is used. And it’s all run on the amount of power that it takes to run three clothes dryers — it’s extremely energy efficient.