12/08/13 - Harry Potter Studio Tour

Anyone who knows me, knows that I am a huge Harry Potter fan...I wrote my dissertation on it, for goodness' sake!  So it's a little shameful that it's taken me as long as it has to venture down to Watford to visit the Warner Bros. Studio Tour - the Making of Harry Potter.




Having had a long tiring day trekking around London the day after seeing Sea Wall and getting a late night, I found that I wasn't really overly enthused when confronted with the prospect of more walking...until we got there, and I went into full-on geek mode.  The sheer size of the buildings were enough to get me excited before we even stepped inside.

The thing that impressed me most about the whole experience was the sheer amount of detail that went into every prop, every costume and every piece of scenery.  Each thing we saw throughout the whole tour was an utter work of art, write down to the hand-written potion bottle labels and the thousands of glass prophecies in the Ministry's Department of Mysteries.

I'll leave you with a few of the many (oh so many) photos we took over the course of the four hours we were inside.






My brother's getting to be more of a poser than I am!







The verdict on Butterbeer: after being told horror stories, I was surprised to actually really enjoy it.  It tasted (to me, at least) like Irn Bru with cream soda foam on top, which I loved.





Walking along Diagon Alley, past all the familiar shops, was amazing.  Even with everyone stopping to take photos, it was hard not to feel a little bit like you'd stumbled right into Harry's world.





I've heard some people turn their noses up at the price of this attraction (I believe it's £29 for an adult ticket), but I thought that it was entirely worth every single penny.  Everything inside was utterly spectacular, and I particularly liked the fact that most of the tour wasn't guided so you're free to wander at your own pace and focus on the parts that you want to.  For example, while most people barrelled past the displays of prosthetics and animatronics, my dad and I watched every information video in its entirety and I found it to be possibly the most interesting part.

After we'd finished gawping at all the amazing things on display (and rather hurriedly whisking me away from the last room in which I got a little bit emotional), we spent a good hour in the gift shop where we did some more gawping.  It wasn't as expensive as I'd expected it to be, but I still didn't buy as much as I would have liked to!

Overall, I thought the experience was incredibly impressive and definitely worth a trip if you're a big Harry Potter fan.  And on a related note, I hope everyone I know who was down at LeakyCon in London this weekend had a totally magical time!

1 comment:

  1. Hey, just curious as to what the title of your dissertation was?

    ReplyDelete