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Disney CEO Josh D'Amaro Posts Photos From Behind the Walls, Including a Ground-Level Look at the Painted Indiana Jones Temple
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Disney CEO Josh D'Amaro Posts Photos From Behind the Walls, Including a Ground-Level Look at the Painted Indiana Jones Temple

Michael Travels
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The best seat for a Disney World construction tour belongs to the guy in the hard hat that says "JOSH." Disney CEO Josh D'Amaro walked three of the resort's biggest projects with Walt Disney Imagineering and posted the photos, and one of them is a ground-level look at the Maya temple for Indiana Jones and the Myth of the Jade Serpent at Animal Kingdom.

WDW News Today and BlogMickey both reported the post on Tuesday, October 20. D'Amaro's stops were Tropical Americas at Animal Kingdom, Monstropolis at Hollywood Studios, and Disney's Lakeshore Lodge.

The temple, from the ground

The upper tiers of a Maya-style temple covered in carved turquoise, red and gold rockwork, surrounded by metal scaffolding, with the sun flaring behind it

The temple for Indiana Jones and the Myth of the Jade Serpent, still wrapped in scaffolding. Image: shared by Josh D'Amaro, via WDW News Today

The temple sits in front of the former DINOSAUR building and is set to open in 2027. Scaffolding still surrounds it, but BlogMickey describes "rich turquoise, red, and gold rockwork" covering the upper tiers, and what looks like a huge fanged jaw wrapped around the central opening.

In early September we reported that the first painted temple sections had gone up while the middle was still bare steel, and later that month aerials showed the middle of the pyramid filled in. Those were aerial views. D'Amaro's photo shows the carved face from ground level, still wrapped in scaffolding.

D'Amaro also shared a tight shot of a carved wooden column: a big layered flower set against carved leaves, with a twisted shaft above it. Neither outlet says exactly where it will stand, though BlogMickey places it with the Animal Kingdom photos.

Close-up of a carved wooden column with a large round flower rosette set between carved leaves, a twisted carved shaft above, rounded beading above and below the leaf block, and a fluted base, on a dirt construction site

A hand-carved wooden column from the tour. Image: shared by Josh D'Amaro, via WDW News Today

Tropical Americas replaces the old DinoLand U.S.A., and its story centers on Pueblo Esperanza, a made-up village drawing on the cultures and landscapes of Central and South America.

Monstropolis, on a tablet

At Hollywood Studios, one of D'Amaro's photos shows an Imagineer holding a tablet with concept art for Welcome to Monstropolis! With Sulley & Mike, the show coming to the Glob Theater. WDW News Today describes Mike, Sulley and other monsters onstage in front of an audience, surrounded by flying door portals.

An Imagineer in an orange safety vest and work gloves holding a tablet that shows colorful concept art of a theater stage full of monsters in front of an audience

Concept art for the Glob Theater show, on an Imagineer's tablet. Image: shared by Josh D'Amaro, via WDW News Today

Per BlogMickey, the first Monstropolis phase pairs the show with Archie's Scare Pig Pizza, the Scareporium shop and Harryhausen's, all slated for 2027. The Monsters, Inc. Door Vault coaster follows later.

Signing the floor at Lakeshore Lodge

The last stop was Disney's Lakeshore Lodge, the Disney Vacation Club resort rising on Bay Lake that opens July 1, 2027. In one photo, D'Amaro, in his "JOSH" hard hat, kneels beside a colleague and signs his name on a concrete floor already covered in signatures, under a wood-paneled ceiling with a triangular skylight. BlogMickey says it appears to be the lobby area. Crews have long marked big builds by leaving their names in a slab or on a beam.

Two people in orange safety vests and brown hard hats kneel on a concrete floor covered in handwritten signatures, one hard hat labeled JOSH, inside a tall room with a wood-paneled ceiling, a triangular skylight and walls of windows

Josh D'Amaro (left, in the JOSH hard hat) signs the floor at Disney's Lakeshore Lodge. Image: shared by Josh D'Amaro, via WDW News Today

If you want to see the finished resort before July, a scale model of Lakeshore Lodge is now on display in Walt Disney Presents at Hollywood Studios.

What D'Amaro said

Before he became CEO in March, D'Amaro ran Disney Experiences, the division that includes Imagineering, so he knows these projects well. In his caption, as quoted by WDW News Today, he wrote: "I got to walk Monstropolis, Tropical Americas and Disney's Lakeshore Lodge with our Imagineers, hear what they're dreaming up, and watch it become real."

He also thanked Imagineering, writing that "their imagination & creativity knows no limits," and signed off with "I can't wait for you to experience it all."

All three projects are aiming for 2027, at least in part. Which one gets your first visit: the Indiana Jones temple, Monstropolis, or a night at Lakeshore Lodge?

Sources

Image credits: photos shared by Josh D'Amaro, via WDW News Today.

Mentioned in this story

Check out our guides for more on each place in this story:

Animal Kingdom Hollywood Studios Indiana Jones and the Myth of the Jade Serpent Welcome to Monstropolis Harryhausen's Archie's Scare Pig Pizza Scareporium Disney's Lakeshore Lodge

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