The song 'There’s a Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow' sets the scene for visitors to Disney’s long running Carousel of Progress attraction.
As the song plays, the carousel begins to rotate transporting riders into the home of an average middle-class American home from the 1900’s, 1920’s and the 1940’s featuring animatronic robots.
“Something that they have in common over the course of the past 100 years is the family and the sense of place that we bring to our homes,” said Rachel Staley, an architectural designer with the Orlando firm BRPH and adjunct professor of design history at Seminole State College. “That I think is something that's pretty constant over all of these decades that are included in the Carousel of Progress.”
Staley said that interior design trends are often driven by technology, available materials, and climate. A major shift came in the early 1900s with the rise of modernism, when designers broke from traditional European styles and reimagined how homes should look in an industrializing world.
“Homes largely were being designed and built the way they had been since the Renaissance,” she said. “Then the modernist came around and these were designers and artists that were looking at all of this industry and progress that we were having as a country and thinking our buildings should look different, like we've come so far as a civilization, our buildings could be better, furniture could be better, it could look more elegant.”
The carousel, which got its first spin at the 1964 World’s Fair in New York City has been a Magic Kingdom attraction since 1975. While the exhibit hasn’t had any major updates since the mid 1990s, Disney recently announced an overhaul.
The decades will be completely replaced with depictions from the 60’s, 80’s and 2000’s, bringing the settings in line with the lived experiences of park visitors.
Staley said each of those decades has hallmarks that made design unique during that time period.
“The 60s, the mid-century modern style is very big, so things are very sleek and minimal, and kind of box scene orthogonal, and we're kind of seeing furniture in a very like new and sleek fashion that's very different from kind of the pre-war eras,” she said.
“Then in the 80s, I think of like comfort, everything's a lot bigger and cushier, there's a lot more texture, especially in textiles, fabrics, curtains, colorful carpet. Then in the 2000s I think we're all pretty familiar with those more neutral kinds of beige tones that really were trending in the early 2000s.”
According to Staley, interior design trends increasingly come from pop culture rather than traditional design sources, and today social media and algorithms shape trends even more quickly.
As a born and raised Orlando Floridian, Staley will miss the old carousel. She believes nostalgia continues to play a role in how people think about home.
“I think we all kind of have that nostalgia for what is going to happen and what we can create, and how we can make our world more beautiful.”
The updated Carousel of Progress is expected to open in 2027.
