Disney has announced that the Villas at Disneyland Hotel will open in September 2023, with bookings for DVC Members, Magic Key Annual Passholders, and the general public starting next month. This post covers all of the details about this new resort tower, with new photos of the rooms and what you need to know before making hotel reservations.
Let’s start with the press release details. According to Disney, the Villas at Disneyland Hotel will blend Walt Disney Animation Studios classics with contemporary designs, offering a celebration of Disney history in the place where it all started. This will be the fourth tower at the Disneyland Hotel, located just steps from the Downtown Disney District.
Every space in the 12-story tower at Disneyland Hotel will immerse you in the storytelling process, bringing some of your favorite Disney stories to life in a variety of themed accommodations. To that end, let’s take a sneak peek inside the various room types at the Villas at Disneyland Hotel, from the 2-person Duo Studios to the Grand Villas…
You can discover the “bare necessities” alongside Baloo and Mowgli in the Duo Studio, which features design inspired by “The Jungle Book.” (Pictured at the top of the post.)
The Villas at Disneyland Hotel will offer 38 of these two-person studios that are similar to those introduced at Disney’s Riviera Resort, which we reviewed here. (Apparently, “Duo Studio” will be the name for these at Disneyland Hotel.)
The Villas at Disneyland Hotel’s Deluxe Studios sleep up to four guests and are themed to the tales of “Sleeping Beauty” or “The Princess and the Frog.”
Of the 350 rooms at the Villas at Disneyland Hotel, 253 are Deluxe Studios. (Assuming the documents Disney filed with the City of Anaheim are correct and nothing has changed since then, which is probably a safe bet.)
If you’re looking for more space, you and your family can spread out in a one- and two-bedroom villa, sleeping up to five and nine guests, respectively. These rooms are inspired by the vibrant colors of “Fantasia” or “The Princess and the Frog.”
The Villas at Disneyland Hotel should feature 20 two-bedroom villas and 19 one-bedroom villas. These villas include a washer and dryer, comfortable living area, plus a full-size kitchen equipped with all the cookware you need to prepare meals.
Finally, the Villas at Disneyland Hotel will offer a handful of multilevel three-bedroom Grand Villas that sleep up to 12 guests.
The first floor features a full-size kitchen, large dining area, and a double-sided fireplace connecting the living area to a private outdoor balcony. The first floor is also home to the primary suite, inspired by “Bambi.”
The Grand Villa also features a spiral staircase leading to the second floor, which features two bedrooms with en-suite bathrooms inspired by “Frozen” and “Moana,” as well as a full washer and dryer.
Reservations for The Villas at Disneyland Hotel can be made beginning on March 15, 2023 for Disney Vacation Club Members by contacting Member Services at (800) 800-9800 and on March 16, 2023 for Disneyland Resort Magic Key holders by contacting (714) 956-6425.
Bookings will open to the public on March 17, 2023, subject to availability. You can make your reservation online or by contacting (714) 956-6425.
Accommodations at the Villas at Disneyland Hotel are limited in availability, and restrictions apply. Subject to change or cancellation without notice.
Although Disneyland’s announcement doesn’t state as much, it’s safe to assume that these will be cash bookings for the Villas at Disneyland Hotel. Disney Vacation Club contracts for the Villas at Disneyland Hotel haven’t gone on sale yet, and point charts have not yet even been released.
For what it’s worth, Disney’s Riviera Resort started (contract) pre-sales to existing DVC Members on March 27, 2019 with the point chart released a couple days before that. General public sales started on April 15, and that resort opened on December 16, 2019. So if the Villas at Disneyland Hotel were following a similar pattern but with a September 2023 opening date, contracts would go on sale…a couple months ago.
The delay could reflect a couple of different things. It could be that the September 2023 opening target is not yet a firm date, and is an aggressive timeline. Although this project has been full steam ahead (based on the progress we’ve observed) and hasn’t really suffered any delays, opening in September 2023 still surprises us.
We figured November was the absolute best-case scenario, with a repeat of Riviera Resort’s opening right before Christmas the most likely outcome, and an outside possibility that the Villas at Disneyland Hotel slipped into early 2024. Given that, September 2023 is a (very) pleasant surprise. (Construction photos above and below are from earlier this month.)
Another possibility is that Disney doesn’t need to rush sales. We’ve been skeptical about other Disney Vacation Club developments, but not this one. Another DVC addition at Disneyland Resort is a no-brainer, slam-dunk concept. There is a ton of unsatisfied demand for another Disney Vacation Club Resort in California; the Grand Californian Villas are the most difficult to book resort, and also the most costly via the resale market.
This will increase Disneyland Resort’s available DVC room inventory six-fold, and that still probably won’t be enough. No matter what the broader market and economy does, this will sell well. If anything, delaying it could be strategic–allowing the existing properties for sale in Florida and Hawaii more time to sell before the Villas at Disneyland Hotel starting eating into those numbers.
In the meantime, Disney can book cash reservations in the room inventory that has yet to be declared. With Disneyland Resort also having insufficient inventory on the hotel side of the ledger, that also makes sense. These rooms will instantly become the highest-priced accommodations at Disneyland Resort, surpassing both the Grand Californian, Disneyland Hotel’s current towers, and whatever the heck is going on with the Pixaradise project next door.
As for how much they’ll cost–that’s hard to say. My guess is that rack rates for the Deluxe Studios will come in above the Grand Californian, but with the possibility for deep discounts during the off-season fill the influx of new room inventory. (That’s exactly what happened with Riviera Resort between December 2019 and March 2020.) So if you want to stay here at the cheapest possible price, your best bet is booking shortly after it opens for a September 2023 off-season stay.
Ultimately, I don’t have much more to say about this new tower that I didn’t already address in our main post about the Villas at Disneyland Hotel. The short version of that is this reminds me a lot of Disney’s Riviera Resort–a bland property that fails on the thematic front, but provides highly-functional accommodations with the appropriate amount of “Disney” touches, while delivering exactly what actual guests want.
It’s disappointing to me that Imagineering doesn’t get a chance to be more ambitious with the overall design and caliber of immersion, but Disneyland Hotel is probably the last place to complain about that. Its theme is literally “Disneyland,” and this is in keeping with how the existing hotel is a self-referential love letter to Walt Disney and his original magic kingdom in a pretty ordinary package. A tower lavishly-themed to Catalan Modernism or whatever next door to Disneyland Hotel would be even more out of place.
The practical reality is that most existing and future Disney Vacation Club members are going to absolutely love this. It checks the boxes for what modern fans want from accommodations and is a stark contrast to the existing DVC room inventory at the Grand Californian. Even if the big box doesn’t do a ton for me, the rooms look really nice. (Beyond that, not everything needs to appeal to me, personally!) I can still appreciate the functional enhancements to the rooms…while also hoping that this makes it slightly easier to book the Villas at Grand Californian!
Planning a Southern California vacation? For park admission deals, read Tips for Saving Money on Disneyland Tickets. Learn about on-site and off-site hotels in our Anaheim Hotel Reviews & Rankings. For where to eat, check out our Disneyland Restaurant Reviews. For unique ideas of things that’ll improve your trip, check out What to Pack for Disney. For comprehensive advice, consult our Disneyland Vacation Planning Guide. Finally, for guides beyond Disney, check out our Southern California Itineraries for day trips to Los Angeles, Laguna Beach, and tons of other places!
YOUR THOUGHTS
Are you looking forward to the Villas at Disneyland Hotel? Glad that Disney Vacation Club is adding another property at Disneyland Resort? Would you like to see something built elsewhere in Southern California? Hope Disney will resume plans to build more hotels in Anaheim? Do you agree or disagree with our assessment? Any questions? Hearing your feedback–even when you disagree with us–is both interesting to us and helpful to other readers, so please share your thoughts below in the comments!
