Walt Disney Imagineering Reveals Animator's Office Details at Magic of Disney Animation - Opening Soon

Walt Disney Imagineering has shared a closer look at the animator's office inside The Magic of Disney Animation at Disney's Hollywood Studios, revealing the level of detail going into the space ahead of the official September 14 opening.

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The video, which we've embedded above, walks through the desk area inside the building. Many of the items on display are real artifacts from the history of Disney Animation — not reproductions.

Among the details called out:

• The animator's desk was saved from the original Animation Academy at Hollywood Studios
• A small building replica of the Feature Animation studio in Burbank, California
• Ping pong balls gifted to the Feature Animation crew in California
• A mirror sourced from a flea market by Dan Abraham, director of Once Upon A Studio
• The Rabbit Rabbit magazine — a weekly publication given out to animators in the Hollywood Studios building itself
• A book collecting caricatures that Disney animators drew of each other and left on each other's desks
• A Mulan crew hat and a Mulan team gift stamp
• A Hercules production jacket
• Chicken Little's glasses
• Animation paper tabs — used by animators to flip through paper without tearing it on the pegs
• A mug gifted to the architects who worked on the original building when it opened
• Red rubber bands — used by animators to hold finished scenes together, and, as WDI notes, also used to shoot at each other

Walt Disney Studios Courtyard

The WDI team took photos of real animators' desks at Disney Animation in California early in the development process, using those images as reference for the look and feel of the space. The goal was to make the environment feel lived-in rather than staged — and based on the level of authentic detail on display, that approach clearly shaped every corner of the desk.

The Magic of Disney Animation officially opens September 14 at Disney's Hollywood Studios. The building houses Olaf Draws!, Off the Page! character meets, Drawn to Wonderland, Once Upon A Studio Theater, and an enchanted art gallery.