Wednesday, August 17, 2011

Treehouse Villas

     I have some pictures of the Treehouse Villas as they were in about 1986.  But first a small bit of history on the Treehouse Villas.

      The Villas opened in 1975 and closed in 2002.  One reason that the Treehouse Villas  were closed was because of the lack of access for the disabled.  For a while the villas were used as private residences for Disney’s International and College Program and later housed Cast members.
   
      In order to reopen the villas Disney would have to follow the guidelines set forth by the “Warren S. Henderson Wetlands Protection Act” legislation of 1984.  Because of the fact that they are built on protected wetlands, no more construction was allowed.  When Disney did decide to refurbish the units (60 of them) they actually lessened the overall footprint of each unit by about 70%.  They did this by removing the living space on the ground floor and extending the space that is located up 10 feet of the ground.

      The "new" Treehouse villas are 3-bed 2 bath octagonal homes on 6 concrete pillars. They are prefabricated a mile away from the site, trucked in 3 sections plus the roof, lifted into place and assembled there atop the pillars.  Four of the Treehouse Villas are handicap accessible and include an entrance ramp.  They opened as DVC at the Saratoga Springs Resort in 2009.


Here are some exterior photos
     

You can see the space for the bedroom on the lower level that does not exist anymore

A good view from the Sassagoula river, which I bet the trees and shrubs are a lot bigger now to block some of the view
I thought it was so cool  that you walked up on to the deck and across a "bridge" to get inside
A look at the deck from the door
the kitchen
Not a lot of room in there


sitting area adjacent to the kitchen
My brother and me enjoying the Disney Treehouse villas
Looking at the door from the middle of the living room
Look at that TV!
Looking toward the bedroom hall
you can see the center support beam behind me in my dads sweatshirt
    I also loved the spiral staircase that lead down to the bottom floor bedroom.  I know I have more pictures of the villas including the downstairs bedroom.  And also pictures of the Peacocks that used to roam around the grounds all the time.  When I find them I will post them.
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2 comments:

  1. Nice article about one of those little-known corners of the Vacation Kingdom!

    ReplyDelete