Four Yellow Houses

 

Directly across Disneyland’s Main Street, USA from the Candy Kitchen, there is a blue-and-white "building" (it's really a facade) with a front porch and lots of Victorian gingerbread. You can climb three steps to the porch and sit in the shade (unless someone got there before you), but you can’t walk through the door. When Disneyland opened in 1955, this was the Intimate Apparel Shop, where a recorded Wonderful Wizard of Bras on a revolving stage taught visitors about the history of ladies’ undergarments. You could also buy unmentionables there, and admire a Singer sewing machine from the 1860’s. Today, the door on the porch is sealed shut and the space behind it is part of the China Closet. The Intimate Apparel Shop lasted only six months, for reasons you’ve probably already guessed. But it really would have come in handy that one time when a Disneyland ride shoulder strap snapped the underwire in my bra.