A close-up look at the first Harmonious firework barge at Epcot

Construction continues at Epcot for the upcoming Harmonious nighttime fireworks spectacular. Today, the first of five separate barges was placed in the center of World Showcase Lagoon. These massive barges are covered in spotlights, fountains, and LED screens. The Harmonious nighttime spectacular was originally supposed to debut in 2020, but is now backed up to 2021.

Unlike with Illuminations: Reflections of Earth, the former show, these barges will permanently be placed in the center of the lagoon. Their enormous size will allow for more guests to see the screens at night, but it also blocks portions of the countries in World Showcase.

Signage was also installed in key areas around World Showcase Lagoon explaining the upcoming show. Eventually, when all the barges are installed, they will become daytime fountains. This will help to hide the not so pretty black steel and mechanics inside of the barges.

The view, seen from the Morocco Pavilion, is currently not great. But, lots of more work is still to come. This shot also showcases numerous projects in the works. In the foreground we have the black curved barge from Harmonious. The shiny rounded structure on the right is the Test Track building (sometimes referred to as the tuna can). The golden dome is the eventual home for the Play! Pavilion. And, the large blue structure in the far background is the show building for Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind, soon to be Epcot’s first roller coaster.

This angle showcases the massive LED screen that will be used in the nightly spectacular. In total there will be four of these types of barges. There will also be one massive center barge.

To give a proper understanding of these structures sizes we manipulated the camera to give the same focal view of the human eye. As you can see, they are certainly large, but they don’t dominate the entire lagoon.

For fans of the technology behind Disney’s work, we took these up-close views of the spotlights and moving arms. These moving arms will reach into the sky while covered in powerful spotlight beams. This will happen while fireworks fill the sky and images appear on the massive screens. There is certainly a lot going into the making of this upcoming show.

The first of the five barges is here to stay. And, we will continue to keep an eye out for more being added and show testing. As said by Disney, this will be their biggest nighttime spectacular. By those words, we can assume this show must be to the level or better than Happily Ever After at the Magic Kingdom or World of Color at Disney California Adventure. Time will show us what secrets are hidden for the show inside of these barges.

What do you think of these structures in the center of the lagoon? Do you think this will become the new best Disney nighttime spectacular? Let us know in the comments below.