First artist's impression of Shanghai Disney Resort

The world got a glimpse of what the much-anticipated Shanghai Disney Resort will look like on Thursday, when the Shanghai Disney Resort Management Company released the first artist's impression of the attraction.

The image shows a night scene of its Enchanted Storybook Castle, the iconic central attraction of the theme park.

It provides the public with a first look at the 11-acre green space at the center of the park and a closer look at the design of the castle with 1:100 scale.

Shanghai's Enchanted Storybook Castle is expected to be the largest and tallest of the castles among all Disneylands worldwide.

"We are excited to see the resort development move into an intensive phase of construction," said Mike Crawford, general manager of the Shanghai Disney Resort.

"We look forward to providing more updates in the future, as we reach key milestones," he added.

Intended to open at the end of 2015, the resort will initially be comprised of Shanghai Disneyland, a Magic-Kingdom-style park as well as two themed hotels, a large retail, dining and entertainment venue, recreational facilities, a lake and transportation hubs.

Covering an area of 1.16 square km, the theme park inside the 3.9-square-km Shanghai Disney Resort will be the world's sixth Disney amusement park and the first on the Chinese mainland.

It will also be the third of its kind in Asia, after the company's theme parks in Tokyo and Hong Kong.

Its construction will cost a total of 24.5 billion yuan (about 3.93 billion U.S dollars).

The resort is a joint venture between the Walt Disney Co. and Shanghai Shendi Group, with Shendi holding 57 percent of shares and Disney the remaining 43 percent.

Innovative new design and technology practices are being used in the construction, including resort modeling and Building Information Modeling (BIM), according to the management company.

This is to ensure efficiencies in its design and construction, with the planned opening of the resort by the end of 2015.

The project will be a combination of Disney global standards with local best practices, and will be "authentically Disney and distinctly Chinese," said Fan Xiping, chairman of Shanghai Shendi Group.

According to Fan, the Disney imagineering team brings new design and construction techniques to China and works collaboratively with local design institutes.

The theme park will create long term benefits for the Chinese construction industry, Fan added.

The is the country's largest Sino-foreign cooperation project in the modern service industry.