Today is the start of HalloweenTime at the Disneyland Resort and for the 18th year, Haunted Mansion Holiday will entertain guests in New Orleans Square. The attraction, themed to The Nightmare Before Christmas, shows what happens when “two holidays collide.”
While Jack Skellington is “decking the halls” in the rest of the mansion, Disneyland bakers are busy creating an enormous gingerbread house for the ballroom scene.
Chefs began baking gingerbread a month ago, and since then, 12 pastry chefs have had their hands in building and decorating the annual masterpiece.
This year’s design features a huge spider hanging above the gingerbread house. Tim Wollweber, Associate Art Director for Disney Parks, commented on the design:
“We wanted to create a monster movie vibe, and a scary spider is a classic and iconic Halloween image. With that in mind, we designed a giant 5-foot spider with eerie glowing eyes and moving legs and mandibles. This multicolor spider is suspended above the Haunted Mansion’s Grand Hall table, attempting to pry the edible mansion from its foundation, revealing candy cane rebar and sparking lights. General chaos ensues as gingerbread zombies watch in astonishment and cocoon-wrapped gingerbread zombies wait to become spider snacks.”
The shopping list for this year’s gingerbread house included 90 pounds of gingerbread, 30 pounds of confectioner’s sugar, 10 pounds of white chocolate, and 45 pounds of fondant.
Take a look at how it’s all put together:
You can visit Haunted Mansion Holiday beginning today in Disneyland Park. The overlay continues beyond HalloweenTime, through the Christmas season, and into 2019.
Source: Disney Parks Blog
Tom is the former host/producer of the Disneyland Edition podcast and is currently the co-host of the Connecting With Walt podcast, plus is also providing Disneyland content from the parks. He enjoys traveling with friends and spending time with family, including his son and grandson. In his spare time he volunteers with Scouts BSA and Cub Scouts, and helped found his son's former Cub Scout Pack. His favorite Disneyland attraction is Space Mountain.
