Adventureland Bazaar
The Adventureland Bazaar started out as a typical Disneyland souvenir store in 1955. But by 1961, the shop was in desperate need for a refresh. Luckily, the perfect imagineer for the job joined WED Enterprises just a few years before: Rolly Crump. During his time at Disney, Crump was an absolute genius at making spaces sing and feel real. His bent sense of humor changed the Bazaar into a shop with character and panache, packed with both vibrant theming and unique gifts you might actually find in a middle eastern bazaar.
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“Dick Irvine came to me and said he needed me to redesign the Adventureland Bazaar so that it could start to make the company some money. The original design of the Bazaar was very dark, and not very well thought out. I was told to redo everything from scratch, and I only had six weeks to do it! I went to Jack Olsen who was head of Merchandising, and he told me that I should go to the boneyard. I said, ‘What's the boneyard?’ and he told me that once something at Disneyland got worn-down or broken, they'd have to replace it. But instead of throwing the thing out, it would go to the boneyard.
“They had some amazing things there, and I ended up reusing old ticket booths, streetlights, crates, you name it. I used to say that we really were building a Bazaar, because we used a little bit of everything we could find to build the thing, so it really was ‘Bizarre’!
“The first time Walt Disney saw the Bazaar, he was with his wife Lilly, and that was the first time I met her. Jack Olsen gave me the idea to decorate the walls with mirrors to make the shop look bigger, and Walt loved how it turned out. He pointed Lilly to the mirrors and said, ‘Look, Lilly! The shop goes on, and on, and on!’ and she just kind of laughed at his excitement. Walt was like a child sometimes with how much he really loved his park, and I loved seeing him that way.”
-Rolly Crump
Adventureland Bazaar
The Adventureland Bazaar started out as a typical Disneyland souvenir store in 1955. But by 1961, the shop was in desperate need for a refresh. Luckily, the perfect imagineer for the job joined WED Enterprises just a few years before: Rolly Crump. During his time at Disney, Crump was an absolute genius at making spaces sing and feel real. His bent sense of humor changed the Bazaar into a shop with character and panache, packed with both vibrant theming and unique gifts you might actually find in a middle eastern bazaar.
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“Dick Irvine came to me and said he needed me to redesign the Adventureland Bazaar so that it could start to make the company some money. The original design of the Bazaar was very dark, and not very well thought out. I was told to redo everything from scratch, and I only had six weeks to do it! I went to Jack Olsen who was head of Merchandising, and he told me that I should go to the boneyard. I said, ‘What's the boneyard?’ and he told me that once something at Disneyland got worn-down or broken, they'd have to replace it. But instead of throwing the thing out, it would go to the boneyard.
“They had some amazing things there, and I ended up reusing old ticket booths, streetlights, crates, you name it. I used to say that we really were building a Bazaar, because we used a little bit of everything we could find to build the thing, so it really was ‘Bizarre’!
“The first time Walt Disney saw the Bazaar, he was with his wife Lilly, and that was the first time I met her. Jack Olsen gave me the idea to decorate the walls with mirrors to make the shop look bigger, and Walt loved how it turned out. He pointed Lilly to the mirrors and said, ‘Look, Lilly! The shop goes on, and on, and on!’ and she just kind of laughed at his excitement. Walt was like a child sometimes with how much he really loved his park, and I loved seeing him that way.”
-Rolly Crump