The Beast’s Library in the Disney Animation Building (California Adventure) has updated it’s character personality survey’s with more questions and available characters, providing a more in-depth experience for park guests.  

Concept art released by Walt Disney Imagineering offers a look into the new Royal Hall at the Fantasy Faire in Disneyland. 

The new addition, which will open in the spring of 2013, will serve as a location for guests to meet various Princesses throughout the day.  

Disneyland has provided a brief update, through several photos, on the status of the new permanent home of the Disney princesses (the Fantasy Faire expansion) being built outside of Sleeping Beauty’s castle in Disneyland.  

The Creative Entertainment team at Disneyland is working on producing a new live entertainment experience for the Fantasyland Theater, which is anticipated to open in the Summer of 2013.  

As a result of the construction, the existing Princess Fantasy Faire will be closing on August 12, however park guests will still be able to meet the various princesses on the path leading to “It’s a Small World,” beginning August 13 until the new expansion opens in the Spring of 2013.  

Disney Parks has released several photos from their Disney Dream Portrait series, photographed by Annie Leibovitz.  The series will feature celebrities in various Disney scenarios, and will be featured as an insert in the fall issues of “GQ,” “O,” “The Oprah Magazine,” “People,” “People En Espanol,” “Vanity Fair,” “Real Simple,” “Essence,” and “InStyle” to promote visitation to the Disney theme parks.    

The Disneyland Resort Gallery recently opened “Crowning Achievements: Creating Castles for Magical Kingdoms,” which features art work and items that inspired the castles used in the Disney theme parks and films.   

Included in the exhibit is concept art for the castles, contemporary art inspired by the castles, and various pieces that explore the interiors of the iconic structures. 

Disney has announced plans to introduce various Marvel characters into a theme park setting for the first time since Disney acquired Marvel in 2009.  Characters suggested to be included would be The Avengers, X-Men, Spider-Man, and various other prominent figures.

The Marvel Adventure family entertainment center, an eight-acre indoor park, is expected to open in the United Arab Emirates in late 2013, and will feature super-hero themed attractions, restaurants and shops.

The park has been scaled down a considerable amount from the original concept art that was shown in 2007, due to an economic downturn in the Middle East.  However, the scaled down park is still hoping to have interactive experiences with Marvel characters through smaller rides and attractions.

Bob Iger, Disney’s CEO, also suggested that Walt Disney Imagineering artists were working on preliminary designs and attraction ideas for theme parks in various locations.  So while Marvel Adventure will be the first Disney Park to feature Marvel characters, Disneyland Paris executives have suggested that Marvel themed attractions may be joining their park in the near future.  If Marvel were introduced into the United States, realistically it would be restricted to the California parks, as Universal’s Island of Adventure has exclusive rights to Marvel characters in Florida, which prohibits Disney from introducing Marvel characters in their four Florida parks.

Disneyland’s Matterhorn Bobsled attraction reopened last week after a five-month refurbishment project had it closed.  The primary change to the ride includes the newly redesigned vehicles, which feature three individual seats per bobsled instead of the original two seats per sled (which provided the opportunity for two riders to sit in a seat in single file).  The new seat design has bumped up the minimum height requirement from 35 inches to a 42-inch minimum.   In other news, the mountain climbers have returned to the Matterhorn as well, however they currently are not listed on the park’s entertainment schedule, so be sure to listen for those announcements if you are visiting Disneyland in the near future.