A Post for 4 of the Best Hours of My Life

I read Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone for the first time in 2nd grade. The first sentence of that book is something I will always remember;
"Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much."
At 7 years old I had no idea that those twenty two words would open the door to a world that I would love and cherish for the rest of my life.
As most Harry Potter lovers, I have wanted to visit the Warner Brothers Studio in London since it opened March 31st 2012. In 2012 I didn't think that right now in 2015 I would be living in Spain for the semester. I didn't think that I would be studying abroad in Spain and would get to spend my semester break in England because it was a $48 plane ride away. I thought maybe I would get the chance to go to Warner Brothers Studio about 20 years from now not 3 and a half years after it opened.
Immediately after my roommate and I booked our flights to England, I booked my ticket for this tour. It was my favorite part about my trip to England besides visiting with the Laybournes. To get to the studio I took a train to Waltford Junction from which I took a shuttle bus to the studio. Pulling up to the studio, I could hardly contain my excitement. I had the biggest grin plastered across my face.
"The Making of Harry Potter" in big letters over the entrance was the first thing I saw when I got off the bus. At this point it hit me that I was actually going to see all of the magic that is Harry Potter. I got my ticket from the box office and then walked to the front doors. I stood outside for a moment before going inside.
The lobby, though seemingly plain, was exciting. Portraits of characters young and old line the top of the walls. The flying car is hanging from the ceiling above the coat and bag check. To the left is the cafeteria and to the right is gift shop. Straight ahead is the line to enter the rest of the studio. You can observe Harry Potter's room from under the stairs at the Dursley's while in line. It was smaller than I expected.
As I stood in line my eyes began to fill with tears of joy. In a few moments I would be walking through the doors that led into the world of Harry Potter. The world that I have come to know and love for almost 12 years was behind a set of doors.
Well a few sets of doors. I waited in line for about 10 minutes before being let into a room where an employee told us of how the book came to be accompanied by a short video. We were then let into another room where we watched another video. This video was about how the films came to be. The video ended with Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, and Rupert Grint inviting us to enter Hogwarts through the Great Hall. As they walked through the doors on screen, the screen went up to reveal the real doors to the Great Hall. We all jumped out of our seats and walked quickly to the doors. Each person was just as excited as I was for those doors to open. The doors slowly swung open to reveal the world we were all so eagerly awaiting.
A guide took us through the Great Hall, telling us facts most of us already knew. There were only 2 tables in the hall so we could easily walk down the middle. By the table on the left there were a set of Ravenclaw and Slytherin robes. On the right there were a set of Gryffindor and Hufflepuff robes. There was also a small section of food on the right table. They change the food with the season. There were Halloween themed sweets and treats out on the table as it was October 30th.

The head table was at the end of the hall, just where it should be. In front of the table was mannequins of all the Hogwarts professors wearing their clothes. Behind the table to the left is the point keeping system for the houses. I waited until everyone else had left so I could have to room to myself. I did this with just about every room but not purposely it just worked out that way. I looked at every piece and read every sign in each section.
From the Great Hall you walk into a section on the directors, producers, executive producers, screenwriters, set decorators, production design, costumers, composers, and hair & makeup. Each section had a written sign on it's role in the film productions. They had items to show for each section. I would have loved to see everything they had for each section but that would take hours to go through and warehouse upon warehouse to display. But those are hours I would willingly spend.
The Yule Ball attire of Hermione Granger, Viktor Krum, Cedric Diggory, and Cho Chang are set out in the costuming sectioin. Hermione's Yule Ball gown is even more beautiful in person.
Leaving this hallway of treasures you enter a larger room. To the left is the Gryffindor boys dormitory and common room. Harry, Ron, Seamus, Dean, and Neville shared this dorm since they were First Years at Hogwarts. A few scenes throughout the movies are filmed with this as the background. My favorite has to be when they are eating candies that have been bewitched to make the consumer sound like an animal.
The Gryffindor common room has been in almost every Harry Potter movie. For the display at the studio they had Harry's invisiblity cloak on display in the doorway. On the ledge above the staircase that leds to the dormitories, the clothes the Trio (Harry, Ron, and Hermione) wore when they went down the trapdoor in the Sorcerer's Stone are on display. Something that I did not know was that on the bulletin board in the common room, extras who played Hogwarts students could create things such as fake club posters to be put on the bulletin board. The set designers thought this would help give it a more realistic feel.

The ultimate hang out spot

Continuing to the right of the common room is the pendulum from the clock tour at Hogwarts. On either side of the pendulum are clothes from the Order of the Phoenix. To the left is Remus Lupin, Nymphadora Tonks, and Sirius Black. Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, and Ron Weasley are to the right.
Next is Dumbledore's office. Each cabinet was full of trinkets that I finally got to really see. The ceiling is covered with portraits of the past headmasters who are all asleep. Not many of the hundreds of books that fill the shelves surrounding Dumbledore's desk are really books. Most are phone books and such that have been made to look as if they are old, magical books. The Pensieve that Dumbledore uses to show Harry the memories of Tom Riddle is kept in the cabinet on the right side of his office. In his office they had 2 mannequins displaying Dumbledore's robes. One for the when Richard Harris was Dumbledore and one for when Michael Gambon took over as Dumbledore after Harris passed away.
From Dumbledore's office I went to the middle of this room to look at the large enclosed area of props. They had the Triwizard Cup and the Horcuxes. Lucius Malfoy's cane was there and much much more.
Next was the potions classroom. Each jar and bottle had ingredients for a potion in them. The desks had cauldrons on them and some of them looked as though they had be bewitched. The spoons in those bewitched cauldrons were stirring the potions on their own. The robes Severus Snape wore were on a mannequin in the middle of the room. A mannequin portraying Professor Slughorn was also in the room.
Hagrid's hut was after. I wish the lighting was better in this section because it was hard to see some of the stuff at the back of the hut. Hagrid's clothes were on a mannequin next to a replica of Fang, Hagrid's dog. The furniture in his hut was not a large as I thought it would be.
I crossed the room to look at the Special Effects section. It had Remus Lupin's trunk and how all the compartments shut on their own. The door to vault 713 in Gringotts was also there. It was handmade and made so well that it was able to be used in not only the Sorcerer's Stone but also in the Deathly Hallows Part II. The door to the Chamber of Secrets was next to this door. It also showed how the flying car, moving staircases, and broomsticks worked. The Quidditch section was next to the broomsticks. Harry Potter and Draco Malfoy's uniforms were on display along with their broomsticks. A set of the balls used in the game were on display as well.
The living room from the Burrow, the Weasley's home, is the next thing you see. Ginny, Fred, George, Molly, and Arthur Wealsey's clothes from the Deathly Hallows part II are on display in the home. You can wave your hand over signs of the magical chores Molly always has going on in the house such as washing dishes and ironing clothes and it is moves as if you are doing them. I felt so at home when looking at this room. Even when reading the books and watching the movies, the Weasley's home has always seemed so homey and comforting.

The Malfoy Manor was next to the Weasley's home. I think they did this on purpose to really showcase the differences in these two families. In comparison, the Malfoy Manor is dark and unwelcoming, perfect for them. The scene set in their home is the meeting with the Deatheaters and Voldemort with Charity Burbage floating above the table as Voldemort was unhappy with her support of Muggle-borns entering the magical world and her teaching of Muggle Studies at Hogwarts. Mannequins dawning each characters clothes from that scene sat around the table.
Borgin and Burke was across from the Malfoy Manor. This display had all of the dark and creepy furniture and decorations this shop has to offer. Most notably it has the hand that Harry got his hand suck in it's grasp in the Chamber of Secrets and the Vanishing Cabinet that Draco used to gain the Deatheaters access to Hogwarts in the Half-Blood Prince.
Directly on the other side of this is a very pink display. It is Professor Umbridge's office. The wall paper is pink with roses and the walls were lined with tea saucers with cats on them. On her desk the quills that were used in the Order of the Phoenix as punishment for those who misbehaved. These quills, as students wrote with them, carved whatever they were writing into the backs of their writing hand. Harry was the first to receive this punishment and the words on the back of his hand read "I must not tell lies." Once Umbridge started working for the Ministry of Magic, her clothing progressively got pinker.
Across from her office are parts of the Ministry of Magic. Two of the Floo Network fireplaces were there. Floo Powder is a glittery powder that allows witches and wizards to travel from place to place going from one fireplace to another. When Voldemort's side had control over the Ministry of Magic, there was a statue of muggles being crushed my the might of magic in the lobby. This statue was to the left of the fireplaces.
In the corner between the Floo Network and the Malfoy Manor was a special section. Each season and holiday they add a special display. Since it was Halloween time when I went, they had people dressed up as Deatheaters! They wore the actual Deatheater clothes used in the movies. These two Deatheaters stood in this corner and scared most people as they walked by. It was quite funny. I wanted a picture with one but I had already asked so many people to take my photo with something and I didn't want to intrude on anymore people's time in this wonderful place.
I headed down the hallway that lead to the second part of this studio. The hallway was lined with the rules that Umbridge created when she was Headmaster at Hogwarts. Pictures from the movies were also on the walls. The last picture before the hallway ends is the first shot from the Sorcerer's Stone and last shot from the Deathly Hallows part II. This made me tear up just a bit.
But those tears quickly left my eyes as I turned away from the pictures to see the Hogwarts Express in front of me. I was speechless for a few minutes. The train was magnificent. I couldn't not get a photo with it so I asked a girl who seemed to be by herself as well. She told me she'd take my photo if I took hers and I agreed.
We began talking after the photos were taken and found out that we were both my ourselves with no one to take our photos. We introduced ourselves and decided to explore the rest of the studio together. Her name is Yejin and coincidentally she is also studying abroad but in the Netherlands. What is even more of a coincidence is that she is from Berkeley, California! What a small world.

At this point in their relationship,
Ron subconsciously knew it was over.

You can go inside the train but you can't enter the compartments. They had one from every movie that the Trio went to Hogwarts on the train. My favorite compartment had to be the one where Lavender put her and Ron's initials in a heart on their way home for the Christmas holiday.

At the end of the train was the compartment from Ron and Harry's first time on the train. It had the sweets Harry bought for them covering the seats along with mannequins wearing the clothes they wore that day. Scabbers, Ron's pet rat, was there as well. Directly across from them were mannequins of Harry, Ginny, Ron, and Hermione wearing the clothes they wore to drop their kids off to catch the Hogwarts Express at the end of the Deathly Hallows part II.

Staring contest!
I got intimated and lost

Since we hadn't gotten all the photos we wanted taken of ourselves, we went back to the previous room. Unfortunately the had closed the part Yejin wanted photos with but the Deatheaters were still there. They were actually kind of creepy. All you could see of their body was their eyes that starred you down from inside the mask. We both got out photos with them and as we headed back to the train they scared us both.


The Backlot Cafe where they sell Butterbeer was next but we skipped getting some. Though we both wanted to, the line was already long and we only had an hour and a half left before we had to get on the last shuttle to the train station and there was so much more to still see. I will just have to go back to try some. Or go to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter in Florida. OR the new Wizarding World of Harry Potter opening at Universal Studios in Hollywood in 2016! (Dad, that's a subtle hint for my 20th birthday next year.)
Exiting the cafe, you enter the Backlot Exterior Sets which include the Knight Bus, number 4 Privet Drive, Harry's childhood home in Godric's Hallow, the Wooden bridge, Hargrid's flying motorcycle, and the Weasley's flying car.

The Knight Bus is just as I imagined it. It's a deep matte purplely, blue color. It is thinner than a double decker bus but most definitely taller. It has 3 levels and beds on each. A chandelier hangs down from the roof and ends just a few inches from the floor of the first level.
Next to it is number 4 Privet Drive. You can walk right up to the house and knock on the door. And that is exactly what I did. Harry spent years in this house with a family who didn't love him but they didn't hate him. All the evidence points to the Durselys hating Harry but they really only hated his magic. If they really hated him they would not have even kept him when they found him on their front stoop. I think Harry and Dudley would have been friends if Petunia and Vernon hadn't pushed their opinions of Harry and his past on Dudley.

Harry's parents house in Godric's Hallow was next to the Dursley's home. In the roof over Harry's room there is a large hole. This was created when Voldemort tried to kill Harry but the spell rebounded off of Harry and hit Voldemort. This house is hardly seen in any of the movies for obvious reasons but I enjoyed being able to see it in person.

In the middle of courtyard is the Wooden bridge that connects the Sundial Garden to Hogwarts. Ginny, Seamus, and Neville destroy part of the bridge in the Battle of Hogwarts so that it the Deatheaters couldn't use it to enter Hogwarts. A few other important scenes throughout the series are filmed on this bridge.

Yejin and I

On the other side of the bridge is Hagrid's motorcycle and the Weasely's car. Both you can sit in. For being half giant, Hagrid's sidecar is small. I had a hard time sitting in it because there wasn't much leg room. Now that I think about it, I think that the motorcycle on display may have not been built to size for Hagrid but tourists. 
There was a lot of leg room in the flying car. It was weird seeing and holding the steering wheel on opposite side of the car. Spain drives on the same side of the road as the U.S. so I haven't noticed much of a difference other than they are crazy drivers. In England, I wasn't even used to it the last day we were there. The seats in the flying car were comfy. Unfortunately, the car didn't actually fly. The last thing you see before going back inside are some of the chess pieces from the Sorcerer's Stone. They are massive!

This is for you Mom

Leaving the Backlot, you enter the Creature Effects Department. There you get to see all of the creatures they have in Harry Potter. They also have the details for how they made the ghosts. They had Fawkes, Buckbeak, a Mandrake, a Hedwig replica, Aragog (an Acromantula), the Basilisk, Dementors, Remus Lupin as a werewolf, Crookshanks, Nagini, and all the prominent House-elves. My favorite creature to see was Dobby. He is my favorite creature in the whole series.

I think this is your sock Abbe,
Sorry :P

Dobby is displayed in a glass box. His eyes are closed and his pillowcase shirt has a bloodstain on it. If I hadn't been with Yejin I would have cried for sure. Dobby died in the Deathly Hallows after being struck with a dagger thrown by Bellatrix Lestrange. House-elves are released from their servitude when they are given real clothing by their masters. Harry released Dobby from the Malfoy's control by tricking Lucius into giving Dobby a sock. I brought a spare sock and left in on the sign next to Dobby's display case to symbolize freeing Dobby from his case. I have seen posts that many other fans have done the same thing.

Can you tell which one is
Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes?

Diagon Alley is right after the Creatures room. I was blown away by how real it looked and felt walking down the street. I was also extremely excited because I forget that it was on the tour. As I passed each shop all I wanted to do was jump over the railing, walk up to the shop, open the door, and explore it. Sadly that isn't allowed. Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes drew your attention in right away. It was light up and the shop itself was also bright orange. You could see all the tricks and treats they had sitting on every shelf. I wanted them all.

Looking at my dream home

Leaving Diagon Alley you enter the Sketch and Model room. There you could see all the drawings and paper models the artists and architects made for bringing the books to life. The last thing in the model room was the biggest and best model of them all; the model of Hogwarts itself. It wasn't life size (I wish!!!) but it was very big.
Looking at this magnificent work of art all I could think about was how jealous I was that Harry, Ron, Hermione, and everyone else at Hogwarts got to call that place home. If I was given the opportunity to go to Wizarding school I would drop everything and go.
The next room was filled with wand boxes lining the walls. Each box had a name on it of someone who participated in making the Harry Potter films in one way or another. Names of actors, producers, extras, Craft Services, make up artists, and many more covered the walls. This was the last room of the tour. Once I stepped past the doorway and into the gift shop, I couldn't go back. Before I took that step I stood there for a moment, taking in the last few moments of this wonderful experience.
If I had more time I would have stayed but I had 20 minutes to look around the gift shop, buy a few things, and get to the last shuttle back to the train station. I showed much restraint and only bought 5 things: a postcard, a magnet, a pair of Ravenclaw socks, a chocolate frog, and a "The Making of Harry Potter" shirt with all the main characters on it. I am wearing the shirt right now and I already ate the chocolate frog.
The attention to detail that was put into every set, every costume, everything is astonishing. That is what I loved the most. I can't choose a specific thing that was my favorite. That's like asking a parent who their favorite kid is.
The world of Harry Potter has gone through so much with me. I've had it with me since I was 7 years old. Almost 12 years. All seven books are kept on my bookshelf. Each well used and loved. I know word for word every line of all 8 films, including the music and sound effects. I've fallen in love with every character, even the ones who I seem to dislike. I know their lives as well as my own. I grew up with them and as they went through changes in life, so did I. I have connected so deeply with this series that it will never not be a part of my life. The world of Harry Potter isn't real to some but will always be to me. Always.