New Rooms Coming to Copper Creek at Disney’s Wilderness Lodge, Plus Construction Until 2027

Walt Disney World has announced resort refurbishments and hotel construction projects for 2025 & 2026. The biggest one of these will take place at and around Wilderness Lodge, and is now confirmed to include a room reimagining. This shares dates, details, plus photo updates on the current projects, and our commentary about the impacts of the work.

This is one of a few projects that were recently announced, along with the Year-Long Pop Century Room Refurbishment and Disney’s Port Orleans Resorts Room Refurbishments Underway Until 2026. These probably are not the only hotel renovations on the horizon, either–just the ones that have start dates earlier in 2025. Keep an eye on our Walt Disney World Hotel Construction Tracker for further updates.

Wilderness Lodge is unlike those two projects because the room redo is actually just one piece of the puzzle there, and probably the smallest. Let’s start with what you need to know on that front, directly from Walt Disney World: From mid-May 2025 to September 2025, Copper Creek Villas & Cabins at Disney’s Wilderness Lodge will undergo refurbishment. While all Resort amenities will remain available, you may notice refurbishment work during daytime hours.

This was to be expected. As discussed in our Disney Vacation Club Resort Refurbishment Timeline, this was already announced at the condo association meeting late last year, and simply given a 2025 timeline. What the latest update does is narrow down the dates, suggesting it won’t be that lengthy of a project.

That also makes sense. Copper Creek has relatively recent rooms, so this is a soft goods refurbishment based solely on timing. It is worth pointing out that pre-existing Grand Floridian and Polynesian Villas received soft goods refurbishments in the last few years that were more ambitious than the standard variety.

For reference, here are the current Copper Creek standard rooms:

Copper Creek opened prior to the wave of Inova pull-down beds, so it’ll likely get during the project. That’s precisely what happened with the GF and Poly rooms. This would mean replacing the sofa sleeper on the far left of the photo with a combo sofa-bed that pulls down from the wall.

Disney has also demonstrated a defter design touch with recent DVC rooms, and we wouldn’t be the least bit surprised to see the interiors ‘thematically streamlined’ a bit. Copper Creek had flashes of excellence before, and if this brings it on par with Boulder Ridge, it’ll be a huge win.

Speaking of which, here’s a look at the new Boulder Ridge rooms to help you visualize what this could look like:

As we’ve mentioned repeatedly, the Boulder Ridge Villas are our new #1 rooms in all of Walt Disney World.

The Boulder Ridge rooms just received a hard goods refurbishment and were gutted in the process. So that project was more significant in scale and scope, but the difference was the starting point. The old Boulder Ridge rooms were really old, and while some of us had nostalgia and sentimentality for them, the new rooms at Boulder Ridge have more in common with the current Copper Creek rooms than they did the old Boulder Ridge ones.

Which is to say that even absent a hard goods refurbishment, the upcoming Copper Creek rooms could end up looking similar to the new Boulder Ridge rooms simply because they’re already a lot closer to that. My expectation is that the flooring, existing bed/headboard, kitchenette, and bathrooms will be unchanged. The biggest wildcard is the dresser, and whether that’ll be converted into a pull-down 5th sleeper and storage combo, similar to what you see in the Boulder Ridge photo. Some of the artwork replaced and Disney details being added are also givens.

Perhaps this is overly optimistic, but my perspective is that the Copper Creek rooms have a near 100% chance of improving as a result of the room redo. The pull-down bed alone almost assures that, but I’d also expect new art featuring the Junior Woodchucks, Humphrey the Bear, or some other outdoorsy Disney IP. Easter eggs to Walt Disney, railroads, and the company’s wilderness-inspired history also seem like givens. Suffice to say, I’m optimistic.

In terms of the impact to guests staying at Wilderness Lodge, there probably won’t be much of one. The last time Walt Disney World did a room reimagining in the main lodge was a few years ago for the hotel rooms. During that, entire floors were taken out of commission one at a time, and the work was only done during daytime hours.

We stayed at Wilderness Lodge twice during that project, and I had to go out of my way to see signs (literally–pictured above and below) of the work. I wouldn’t have even known it was going on, but for those and various hallways being blocked off, which was visible from the lobby below.

If you’re staying above or below one of the floors being worked on and you tend to take naps during the day, it’s entirely possible your experience could differ. In which case, we’d simply recommend placing a room request to be on a floor that’s at least one-removed from the current progress. This mostly applies to guests staying in the Copper Creek Villas, though. If you’re staying on the hotel side of Wilderness Lodge, you should be fine without any requests.

As intimated above, this is not the only work being done at or around Wilderness Lodge in 2025 and beyond.

Walt Disney World filed a construction permit a few months ago for Wilderness Lodge that reflected a lengthy and large-scale project taking place over the next two years. We discussed this at length in New Permit for Wilderness Lodge Construction Project Lasting Until December 2026.

The permit itself didn’t tell us much, only that it was “general construction” and assigned to Adena Corporation, which is a regular collaborator with Walt Disney World. The permit was purposefully extended beyond the default 1-year timeline to December 25, 2026. The project is also being handled by Walt Disney World’s Facility Asset Management (FAM) group rather than Walt Disney Imagineering. This typically suggests that’s maintenance of an existing facility rather than a wholesale construction project. Resort refurbishments–even more ambitious ones like that of the Grand Floridian–go through FAM.

There are a number of possibilities as to what that project lasting through December 2026 could entail.

One theoretical candidate is converting more of the Wilderness Lodge hotel inventory into Disney Vacation Club, but I’m highly skeptical of that. There’s already a ton of DVC inventory available for purchase or coming online, including in this very region of Walt Disney World. Plus, the hotel rooms are brand-new! This isn’t it.

Another possibility is a pool refurbishment. Again, that’s unlikely. Nothing has started or been announced, and a pool project of that duration would’ve appeared on the calendar by now to alert guests. So that almost certainly isn’t it, either.

This leaves the most likely candidate as exterior refurbishment work to Wilderness Lodge.

That project started only a few days after the permit was filed, and Walt Disney World added a bulletin to the website with an open-ended timeframe. That’s a long time for exterior refurbishment work, but that wouldn’t be too surprising. Walt Disney World took its time with similar projects at Yacht and Beach Club a couple years ago.

Accordingly, we’re going with exterior refurbishment work as the most likely project associated with the permit lasting through December 2026. While the work could last that long, it also could be a case of Disney erring on the side of caution.

As for guest impact of the exterior refurbishment, we also don’t expect a tremendous amount.

I actually just stayed at Wilderness Lodge during a recent trip while this project was ongoing. Mildly funny story, as I hadn’t planned to stay there–I was booked at Pop Century for an “important” research stay there. However, as Mears Connect was dropping me off at the hotel, Sarah got a call from Disney asking if they could bump me to Wilderness Lodge because Pop was overbooked.

This is the kind of thing you only hear about on the internet, but never happens to you. (In fact, it had never happened to me prior to this!) And while I probably should’ve stayed at Pop Century for the sake of research…c’mon, it’s Wilderness Lodge! I’m only human. Of course I took the free upgrade.

Anyway, the point is that I could see the exterior work being done from my balcony. I also walked around the resort to scope out any other work being done. There were small areas of scaffolding up on various portions of the resort.

Not once did I hear anything from my room, but my room was sufficiently removed from the exterior work. If the work proceeds in this targeted fashion, this is going to be the experience of probably 98% of guests staying at Wilderness Lodge at any given time.

The only exception to this is the rooms that are near the scaffolding, but those will probably be taken out of commission if/when the work gets to those points. So again, a simple room request to be away from the work should suffice. I probably wouldn’t even proactively make that request since the odds of impact are exceedingly low.

Finally, there’s the ongoing work at the former River Country site, which is nearby Wilderness Lodge.

A couple months after this project resumed, Walt Disney World finally officially confirmed that the project has resumed under a new name: Disney Lakeshore Lodge (formerly Reflections – A Disney Lakeside Lodge).

In the announcement, Walt Disney World confirmed that construction is currently underway and that new mixed use property (meaning it’s Disney Vacation Club and a regular resort, similar to Disney’s Riviera Resort) is projected to open in 2027. That means construction between now and then.

Construction on Disney Lakeshore Lodge was also ongoing during my recent stay (above photo taken from the boat dock at Wilderness Lodge).

During that, I observed construction in action on boat rides to and from Magic Kingdom. Most interestingly, work was being done starting early in the morning–even when I departed for Early Entry–and on weekends. The large cranes were moving materials even at 7 am! So clearly it’s full steam ahead on Reflections–err, Disney Lakeshore Lodge.

While technically between Wilderness Lodge and Fort Wilderness, the Disney Lakeshore Lodge construction site is much closer to Fort Wilderness than Wilderness Lodge. It’s far enough away that, again, my expectation is that the impact to guests at Wilderness Lodge should be minimal. You’ll see work in the distance, but that’s about it.

The biggest exception to this is guests staying in the Cascade Cabins on the far end (closer to Fort Wilderness).

At some point, Disney is going to start building the previously-announced A-frame cabins and treehouse villas in the general vicinity of the current Cascade Cabins. Once that begins, guests staying in those waterfront DVC units that are closest to Fort Wilderness will likely be able to see and hear work being done.

Guests staying on the far end of Boulder Ridge might also be able to see or hear work from their balconies for the A-frame cabins and treehouse villas.

Probably not enough to justify avoiding those rooms, unless you like sitting on your balcony and being immersed in the wilderness as you enjoy your morning coffee or decompress midday. That’s actually me–so I would consider requesting a room away from the action at Boulder Ridge (those are also really long hallways, so a room request is never a bad idea there).

Again, the main building of Wilderness Lodge is pretty far from this project. I couldn’t see the cranes from my room (which faced that direction) and the two photos above taken from the monorail don’t even show Wilderness Lodge because it’s fairly far out of the frame. This isn’t to say work on Disney Lakeshore Lodge won’t be visible or audible at some point between now and 2027–it is a 10-story tower, after all–but it’s not a project that would concern me as a hotel guest at Wilderness Lodge.

Ultimately, there’s a lot of current and upcoming work at Wilderness Lodge between now and 2027. All of this might sound overwhelming, to the point that the totality of it makes you rethink staying here. If you’re really averse to visual blight and noise, perhaps you should.

Personally, this will not cause us to rethink our upcoming stays at Wilderness Lodge–not even with a toddler who needs midday breaks for naps. Even though it’s going to last multiple years, the work is sufficiently isolated, targeted, or off in the distance that it gives me no pause. This won’t be as bad as staying at the Polynesian during Island Tower construction, Riviera Resort from Caribbean Beach, Gran Destino Tower from the rest of Coronado Springs, or even Disney Lakeshore Lodge from Fort Wilderness.

While I have some strong thoughts about the upcoming 10-story Disney Lakeshore Lodge and am highly protective of Wilderness Lodge and its thematic integrity, none of that extends to avoiding stays at the property between now and 2027. Perhaps that’ll change if more projects are revealed that have more of an impact, but for now, I think most guests will be perfectly fine with room requests if they’re really worried. Even if you don’t make a request, you’re unlikely to be within earshot of the work.

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YOUR THOUGHTS

Thoughts on the construction at and around Wilderness Lodge between now and 2027? Excited for the room refurbishment at Copper Creek? Have you stayed at Wilderness Lodge since work began on the exterior or adjacent Disney Lakeshore Lodge? What was your experience? Did you even notice that these projects were happening? Do you agree or disagree with our recommendation to make a room request rather than stay elsewhere? Any questions we can help you answer? 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!