Harry Potter Studio Tour

In the beginning, this trip was entirely Dr Who.  It was after learning more about what London has to offer that a studio tour of Harry Potter was included. Steve was fantastic in organizing the necessary tickets and figuring out how to get to the studio as it was not directly on the train network.

I have to admit that this tour was one of my favorite parts of our “Holiday”. Every time a new book or movie came out, I had to re-read the entire series before starting the new book/film. Please don’t shoot me, but it wasn’t until the 4^th book came out that I started reading the series…I was completely hooked and have truly enjoyed this series. During the first week after my foot surgery (on 10 December 2013), I watched the entire series again…this time watching out for all the different things I discovered on the tour. Here are some of the highlights:

 




Scott,  love his grin! Here we are on the train heading to the studio.

 

The official bus that took us from the train station to the studio. Both kids were loving the opportunity to ride a double decker bus. 

The Entrance

 

Steve is walking towards us with our tickets

  

I love the Weasley's! They were never afraid to show their love!

 

In the lobby was the only place to see the Weasley's car.

 

Let the tour begin...

This is not the way the tour took us, but my own way of remembering the details...  I'm trying to put the pictures in an order similar to how there were shown us in the movies.

Also, we were there in late November 2013, so all the sets were decorated for Christmas

 

 

4 Privet Drive

 

 

 

I was amazed that it truly was a broom closet. Another surprise was that Harry's bed was a cot and his bedding was a sleeping bag.



This is actually at Kings Cross Station and not part of the tour...it just fits putting these photos here.





It was fun 'pushing' my children off to school. :)

Diagon Alley

 

 

It really is a long alley with fun shops on both sides. Many things got changed with each movie, except for Ollivanders Wand shop and Gringotts bank. After Fred and George Weasley set up their joke shop, that too did not get changed.

 

 

 

The color differences are due to the lights changing from a day to night setting. This happens quite a bit on the tour.

 

If the railing hadn't been there, I would have wanted to explore this shop. The movies made it seem like a lot of fun!

 

 

Hogwarts School of Magic

 

The Great Hall

These doors are HUGE!

They learned real fast that using real food was not a great idea. Ice cream and chocolate melt!

The first movie used real candles, but dripping wax and falling candles had them putting in digital candles for all the other movies.

Love the owl!

 

Looking back at the entry doors.

 

The Classrooms

 

Only the Potions classroom set was available on the tour. Each of the jugs and bottles have things in them. It could be dried bones, berries, guts from the butcher...they were very creative. Had to be with over 1000 bottles to showcase.

 

Gryffindore Common Room and the Boys Dormitory

 

 

Costumes from year 3

Look closely at the tree decorations, I would never consider those ornaments on my tree. :)

The fireplace where we would see Harry's Godfather, Sirius Black.

I chose Ron's bed to showcase because of the knitted blanket. An interesting thing we learned about the poster beds: they were made for the 1st movie when the boys were 11 years old. Then they grew, and grew, and grew, but the beds stayed the same size. The actors were gracious and would curl their legs whenever they were being filmed while in bed.

 

 

Dumbledore's Office

 

I like Scott in the picture so that you can see the scale of the set. This one is of the staircase heading up to the headmaster's office.

The stairs behind Dumbledore lead up to his astronomy room.

 

The Sword of Gryfindore is above the shelf. I didn't get a good shot of the Sorting Hat, but it is on the other side of the office above where the pensieve was stored.

 

Other BIG Sets at Hogwarts

 

One of the Moving Staircases

 

The clock is enormous and the pendulum was swinging away for the crowds. Have to admit that I never bothered to check if it had the right time or not...

 

I thought it interesting for the snake door to be used in 2 different movies. Next to the door is the lock used at a vault in
Gringotts bank.

 

This bridge is seen in in most of the movies, so it still amazes me that this small section of the bridge can seem so big on screen. That's what the magicians are for.

 

 



 

This is to show you how uneven the floor is.



The gate at Hogwarts



The wrought iron work is fantastic!

 

 

Hagrids Hut. They actually had 2 sets, but only one on the tour. The first set was with overlarge furnishings so that when normal sized people sat there it looked like really big furniture. The other set was the opposite, letting Hagrid and his overly large dog be comfortable. There were also lots of cages and wheels hanging from the ceiling.

 

Portraits were hung all over the place, just like in the movies. They were painted by real artisits and all of them were of real people. Some were family members, but most were of the crew and supporting staff.

The first portrait that guarded the entrance to the Gryffindore common rooms.

 

 

The Mirror of Erised. Please note that Stephanie is inside the mirror taking her own picture.

The Goblet of Fire. It was carved from a single piece of wood and is huge! The carving in the center is quite intricate.

Mad Eyed Moody's cage for much of the 4th movie.

 

The Monster textbook.

The giant chess pieces from the first movie.

  

Ministry of Magic

 

 

These sets are 3 stories tall and I'm taking my pictures looking up at them. they really are these bright, vibrant colors.

 

 

This was taken with a different camera, but you can see the exits for the flue powder fireplaces.



Crushing Muggles

 

Dolores Umbridge's office at the Ministry. Do you remember all her plates with kittens on them in her office at Hogwarts? We learned that they gathered kittens from many sources and when they were finished taking all those pictures/videos of the kittens they were all adopted out, many of them to the cast and crew.

 

Dark Magic

 

When you watch the 5th movie again, watch how Dolores Umbridge's pink dresses get darker as she grows stronger in her power at Hogwarts.



The Malfoy's -- I loved that Mrs. Malfoy was always elegant, even in a forest gone wild with war.

Lord Voldimort's companions

 

His wardrobe was ugly! It reminded me of a sickly green, dirty sheet...

Tom Riddle's gravestone. The set is very tall.

The tangible Horcruxes. Very bad magic! Harry and Nagini, the snake, wouldn't fit in this display case.

 

Other Sets

 

I love this big purple bus! So much so that I even built a Lego bus (from a kit).

 

The shrunken head is so funny in the movie!

 

Scott and Stephanie in all their purple glory!

 

The 3 decker bus is a real bus that used 2 double decker buses to make one. It is so tall that they had to go through London on a specific route so they wouldn't have any bridges too low for them.
Because of all the traffic woes this would cause, they did all their filming late at night. Which was perfect as Harry was picked up at night. :) It's one of my favorite scenes from the movies.

 



When I was reviewing the photos, I couldn't place where I had seen this in any of the movies. Stephanie couldn't recall either. So I posted it on Facebook and asked about it. Thankfully one of my friend's daughter (same age as Scott) recognized it right off as the Leaky Cauldren! Well duh! That large crack should have given me a huge clue!

This set is very big! Those little barrels on each side are really big barrels.





 

This set is actually an optical illusion. Remember the scene when Harry is staying at the Leaky Cauldren after he blew up his aunt? The Maid knocks on a door and says "room service" and gets a roar back blasting her hair with wind, she turns around with her gear and goes another direction. Click on the photo to get a bigger view and you can see what I mean...that chair at the end of the corridor is only a dolls chair.



The Yule Ball

 

 

I loved the wardrobe here...so regal.

  

Poor Ron! Even I would be hard pressed to wear these!

 

The chocolate bar at the party...lovely, but fake... 

 

Harry, Hermione and Ron

 

Year 6

This was clever...sewing green screen fabric on the inside of his invisibility cloak.

 

Quiditch. This was all we got for the game outside of the "green screen" part of the tour. We were not allowed to take photos in the "green screen", so this is it...

 

Speaking of the green screen, here is the origami and the feather that was seen in a couple of the classes.

Hagrids flying motorcycle. I loved the sequence of editing in the 7th movie, especially when the bike gets turned upside down and Harry 'runs' along the top of a bus...  :)

The goblins drive this contraption along guide wires. The seat stays level while the wheels go wherever the wires take them.

In Godricks Hollow. The house Harry's parents were killed.

 

Creatures

 

Dobby was behind glass, but I have to admit that I really liked him!

 

Giant spiders...I totally agree with Ron...why couldn't it be to follow the butterflies?
Also, the head of the monster...

 

Buckbeak, the Hippogrif

 

Supporting cast and their wardrobes

 

Arthur Weasley

Molly Weasley's clock and her knitting needles...sadly we didn't get a good picture of her as she is sitting behind a table in the set.



Professors

Luna Lovegood's dresses and other costumes

More costumes...loved the lavender dresses!

Gryffindor

Ravenclaw

Hufflepuff



Slytherin

 

 

 Saved the best for last!

 

Hogwarts Castle Model

 

At the end of the tour there was this wonderful surprise for us; Hogwarts castle all laid out in miniature. There is a slow grade ramp around the edge that spirals you down a complete level so that you can see the castle in all it glories from both vantage points. They actually used this for all of the movies.

 

Be sure to click on the pictures for a closer look at the details.

 

 

 

See the Owlry in the background amidst the lights.

 

 

 

 

 

Moving from day to night...

At the bottom is the boat house where Snapes died.

This set was totally mesmerizing!

 

When we were finished ogling the castle, there was one last piece of the tour:



This room was not a set, but you felt you were in Ollivander's Wand Shop. There was a wand box for every single person who had worked on the movies; the cast, all production workers, food handlers, producers, writers...absolutely everyone! If you knew someone who should be represented, there was a couple of tour guides with lists of where everyone's box was located. Steve and I were really impressed with this finale of the tour.

 

Thank you for enduring this long blog.
We spent a few hours there in the studios and thoroughly enjoyed it.

Sharon...who sometimes wishes she had a wand to fix her foot!