Tophloaf

My wife’s therapist told her. “This is not your bag of shit”. You don’t have to pick it up. Tough for many of us

Honestly they are great to work for. Things you might be expected to design or figure out in a normal architecture office in a day, you might have a week at Disney. They move slowly and think things through to make sure its really the best and most creative design it can be. They build things to be there for 60 years. If you're working for a developer they just want to make a profit and get out, so its a different mind set.

Honestly the engineering for the castle its self is pretty incredible. There are multiple stories underground, tunnels connecting to other areas and a ride, its also the largest castle disney has ever built. Also, when architects design buildings on unstable ground they have to sink "piles" into the ground similar to the way you might think of a dock in a lake. Well the castle has 100+ piles that go over 100' into the ground, its an incredible piece of engineering.
http://www.insidethemagic.net/2014/04/closer-look-at-enchanted-storybook-castle-with-ride-restaurant-shows-in-biggest-ever-theme-park-castle-for-shanghai-disneyland/

Once a project is thought up by an executive somewhere it enters what Disney calls "blue sky" which is essentially the brainstorming or conceptual phase of the project, maybe it gets scrapped here, maybe they find a direction and move forward. Then a team of architects, engineers, modelers, set designers, etc. will be assembled to begin planning the "land". Think Tomorrowland, several buildings, rides, open spaces, restaurants, menus, everything that goes into it. Architects design buildings, open space s are designed along with theming and set pieces, just like a normal architecture project. Things move forward over the course of a year or two until construction begins, then another year or two of construction depending on the size.

As someone who works in hollywood and is not a union member, I can tell you there are tons of movies, TV shows, commercials being made that are not union. These shows are often called no/low pay. Where in people work on the show for experience in hopes of making connections and working on their portfolio. Unfortunately the system gets abused and people are often asked to work for free with very little reward.