We booked a weekend in Orlando as a getaway to celebrate Mom's birthday, and later we found out it was going to be Spring 2018 Dapper Day Weekend at Walt Disney World! Since we were going to be there that very same weekend we decided we would participate in our first Dapper Day.
Dapper Day started at Disneyland as an unofficial event to encourage participants to visit Disneyland in stylish vintage inspired clothes. The original idea was to recapture some of the magic and glamour of visiting Disneyland in the 1950's & 1960's when many folks visited the park in their finest clothes. It has expanded to include stylish dress of all time periods (but particularly the Main Street U.S.A. straw hat and suspenders look for Men and the mid-century dress look for Women) or other stylish Disney inspired looks. It's an opportunity to spend a day (or days) in the park dressed up. It has expanded to include Walt Disney World and Disneyland Paris.
Mom and Dad have loved all things vintage (clothes, design, architecture) for years and they started collecting vintage & retro clothing & collectibles starting back in their college years. The whole Dapper Day thing took off while we have been living on the east coast and this was the first opportunity for us to participate.
Once we knew our trip would coincide with Dapper Day we set out to put together our outfits. We decided we'd all go in Dapper attire...the whole family including the kids. Teenage Son, the pin fanatic was looking forward to all the Dapper Day pins he could get his hands particularly the unofficial Dapper Day pin released by Disney. The event is not an official event, but they are very accommodating and there ended being tons of people all dressed up.
Our outfits would coordinate with each other largely by using blues & yellows. Mom & Dad put their outfits together mostly with pieces they had already. Mom's outfit channeled Mary Poppins with a vintage inspired dark blue dress. The dress was accessorized with a red belt, a blue & white Mary Poppins scarf and a carpet bag purse. Dad built his outfit around blue seersucker shorts that was paired with a pale yellow shirt. He wore them with a blue coat and a pink bow tie & pocket square and one of his typical fedoras- a black straw one. Teenage son wanted a "Figment" inspired outfit...so we went with a purple shirt, pink bow tie, and pale yellow suspenders. He also wore blue seersucker shorts. Toddler Son wore a blue seersucker pant & vest combo with a pale yellow shirt and blue bow tie. Toddler Son alternated between a set of vintage Walt Disney World Mickey Ears and a Sam Sneed hat...his favorite hat.
As part of the Dapper Day festivities there was a Retro Disneyland Slide Show presented by Author & Humorist Charles Phoenix. Charles Phoenix collects vintage slides and curates them into presentations that are hilarious commentaries on mid-century design and style. Mom & Dad grew up in Southern California and attended college at Cal Poly Pomona not too far from Charles Phoenix' hometown of Ontario, California.
They discovered his first book "Cruising The Pomona Valley 1930-1970- A Tour Guide" at the cashier counter of the Ontario, CA institution "Vince's Spaghetti Restaurant". This led them to attend a luncheon of the Pomona Valley Historical Society where they first saw one of Charles Phoenix' slide shows. Eventually they would see another of his slide shows at the Hollywood's Egyptian Theater and would end up purchasing several of his other books. They love the collection of photos filled with mid-century life, design, & style...all of which are the author's specialty. It had probably been 15 or 16 years since they had seen his shows. We ended up buying his latest book, meeting him after the show and getting him to sign it. Toddler Son likes his book "Southern California in the 50's" and was enjoying the new book "Addicted to Americana". "Addicted to Americana" combines highlights of the slide collection with a bit of a memoir of the Author's life and travels and it's a great book.
They discovered his first book "Cruising The Pomona Valley 1930-1970- A Tour Guide" at the cashier counter of the Ontario, CA institution "Vince's Spaghetti Restaurant". This led them to attend a luncheon of the Pomona Valley Historical Society where they first saw one of Charles Phoenix' slide shows. Eventually they would see another of his slide shows at the Hollywood's Egyptian Theater and would end up purchasing several of his other books. They love the collection of photos filled with mid-century life, design, & style...all of which are the author's specialty. It had probably been 15 or 16 years since they had seen his shows. We ended up buying his latest book, meeting him after the show and getting him to sign it. Toddler Son likes his book "Southern California in the 50's" and was enjoying the new book "Addicted to Americana". "Addicted to Americana" combines highlights of the slide collection with a bit of a memoir of the Author's life and travels and it's a great book.
The Retro Disneyland Slide Show concentrated on the years 1955-1967...basically the heroic Walt Disney years of the park. It was presented in the convention center of Disney's Grand Floridian Resort where there was also an exhibition room of vintage & retro clothing and accessories. We spent the morning watching the show, looking at the vendor tables and then headed to the Magic Kingdom at 1:00.
We spent most of our day riding rides! The crowds were pretty heavy all day. The lines were really long for all of the Instagram worthy photo opportunities. We ended up just enjoying our day, and celebrating Mom's birthday spending time together in the Magic Kingdom. Our original fast passes were for Pirates of the Caribbean, Peter Pan's Flight, & Space Mountain. We then had success obtaining a series of follow up Fast passes so we did not end up doing any standby lines for the rest of the day. Highlights would be the time spent in Tomorrowland (we were wearing a lot of Tomorrowland blue) riding the People Mover & Walt Disney's Carousel of Progress. It was a fun day and we would consider doing it again...but probably a Fall event as it was hot to be wearing all of that fancy clothes!
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