Must-See Sets at the Studio

If you’re a Harry Potter fan, the Warner Bros. Studio Tour London is a dream come true. Located just outside London, this incredible experience lets you walk through the actual sets where Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, and Rupert Grint filmed the movies. You’ll see everything from the famous Great Hall to the quirky Burrow, and trust me – every single detail will blow your mind.

Warner Bros. Studio Tour London – The Making of Harry Potter gets more than 2 million visitors annually, so book your tickets in advance. The Standard Ticket is both cheaper and more popular but you explore the studios on your own. With the costlier Guided Tour Ticket a guide walks you through the sets while sharing stories.

? Great Hall – Where the Magic Begins

Step into the iconic Hogwarts dining hall with floating candles and long house tables.

Walking into the Great Hall is like stepping straight into the movies. This is where they filmed six of the Harry Potter movies, and you’ll see the real props like Dumbledore’s lectern and the House Points Counter. Those floating candles above your head? They’re there, creating the same magical feeling you remember from watching Harry’s first night at Hogwarts.

What’s cool is seeing how they used this one room for so many different scenes. The same space where first-years got sorted into their houses also became the elegant ballroom for the Yule Ball. You can sit at the same tables where Harry, Ron, and Hermione shared countless meals and made plans to save the wizarding world. The costumes from all four houses are displayed on the walls, and you’ll want to take about a hundred photos here.

? Platform 9¾ and the Hogwarts Express

Walk through the wall, pose with a trolley, and board the original Hogwarts train.

This is probably where you’ll get your best Instagram shot of the day! The famous trolley is permanently stuck halfway through the wall, so you can recreate that magical moment of running through the barrier. But the real treat is getting to board the actual Hogwarts Express.

You can walk through the train compartments they used in filming. Each one is set up to look like different scenes from the movies – you might recognize the compartment where Harry first met Ron, or where they had some of their most important conversations. The seats are the same velvet ones from the films, and there are even old-fashioned trunks in the luggage racks. It’s like being transported right back to Harry’s world.

? Diagon Alley – Wizarding World’s Shopping Street

Wander past Ollivanders, Weasleys’ Wizard Wheezes, and Gringotts Bank.

Walking down Diagon Alley is magical. You can peek into all the shop windows and see things like dusty wand boxes at Ollivanders and all the crazy joke products at Weasleys’ Wizard Wheezes. The whole street looks like it’s been there for hundreds of years – the buildings lean at weird angles and everything looks perfectly worn and lived-in.

What’s amazing is how much detail they put into shops you barely see in the movies. Every single storefront has its own personality. The joke shop is bright and chaotic, while other shops look more mysterious and ancient. You’ll want to spend ages just looking at all the little details in the windows and on the signs.

? Privet Drive and the Dursleys’ House

Peek into No. 4 Privet Drive and see Harry’s cupboard under the stairs.

This part always hits people in the feels. Seeing Harry’s tiny cupboard under the stairs really shows you how awful the Dursleys were to him. It’s shockingly small – you can’t believe they made a kid live in there for eleven years. But it also makes you appreciate even more how amazing it must have been for Harry to discover he was a wizard.

The whole house is exactly what you’d expect from the Dursleys – everything is perfectly clean and boring. Aunt Petunia’s kitchen is spotless, and you can see Uncle Vernon’s newspapers everywhere. It’s the complete opposite of all the warm, magical places you see later in the tour, which drives home how miserable Harry’s life was before Hogwarts.

? The Forbidden Forest – Enter If You Dare

A spooky walk-through experience featuring giant spiders and eerie effects.

Okay, this part is genuinely creepy! They built 19 massive trees for this set, each one over 12 feet wide. As you walk through, you’ll encounter giant spiders (don’t worry, they’re fake!) and other magical creatures lurking in the shadows. The sound effects are really well done too – you’ll hear things moving around that you can’t quite see.

They’ve hidden loads of cool details throughout the forest. Look out for centaur hoofprints in the mud and claw marks on the trees. The lighting makes everything feel mysterious and a bit dangerous, just like in the movies. Even though you know it’s all fake, it’s still pretty thrilling to walk through what feels like the real Forbidden Forest.

? Gringotts Wizarding Bank – Pure Goblin Gold

Explore the goblin-run bank and see the impressive marble hall and vaults.

Gringotts is seriously impressive. The marble lobby looks exactly like it did in the movies, and you can see the underground vaults where all the wizarding gold is kept. The coolest part is seeing Bellatrix Lestrange’s vault, which is filled with hundreds of fake gold pieces that look totally real. You can even see the destruction from when the dragon escaped – they show you the same area before and after the chaos.

Everything about this set screams “this is where rich wizards keep their money.” The marble columns are huge, and all the bronze fittings look expensive and important. It really makes you understand why everyone thought Gringotts was the safest place in the wizarding world – until Harry and his friends proved them wrong!

? Potions Classroom – Snape’s Domain

Check out the bubbling cauldrons, dusty textbooks, and magical ingredients.

Professor Snape’s classroom is exactly as intimidating as you remember. The shelves are lined with hundreds of bottles containing all sorts of weird ingredients, each with handwritten labels explaining what gross thing is inside. Some jars have floating bits that look genuinely disgusting, while others contain dried herbs that you can actually smell.

The whole place feels dark and unwelcoming, which is perfect for Snape’s character. You can see scorch marks on the wooden desks from all the potion accidents over the years. Standing in here, it’s easy to imagine how nervous Harry and his classmates must have felt trying to brew potions while Snape watched them with that stern expression.

✨ Dumbledore’s Office – Secrets of the Headmaster

Look inside the swirling Pensieve and see the Sword of Gryffindor.

Dumbledore’s office is packed with so many magical things you won’t know where to look first. The famous Pensieve is there, along with the Sword of Gryffindor and loads of strange magical instruments that nobody really knows what they do. Fun fact: this same set was also used as Professor Lupin’s classroom in one of the movies!

Every single bookshelf and portrait has been carefully placed to make it look like Dumbledore actually lived and worked here for years. There are handwritten notes on his desk and spell books with real magical formulas written in them (created by the prop team). The Sorting Hat sits in its usual spot, looking as wise and ancient as ever.

? The Ministry of Magic – Behind the Bureaucracy

Step into the towering fireplaces and magical government corridors.

The Ministry of Magic set is huge and shows off the movie magic behind the scenes. Those green tiles you see everywhere? They’re made of wood painted to look like ceramic tiles – that must have taken forever to do! The whole place feels very official and important, like a government building should.

You can see the magical fireplaces where Ministry workers travel through the Floo Network, and there are hundreds of paper memos flying around overhead (they’re automated, not real magic, unfortunately). The lifts have incredible metalwork detail, and the whole place gets darker and more sinister in the later movies as Voldemort’s influence grows.

? Creature Effects & Animatronics Room

Discover how Dobby, Buckbeak, and magical creatures were brought to life.

This section is fascinating if you love seeing how movies are made. You’ll learn how they created beloved characters like Dobby the house-elf and Buckbeak the Hippogriff using puppets and animatronics instead of just computer effects. Watching the detailed models move and seeing their facial expressions is amazing.

The interactive displays show you how teams of puppeteers worked together to make these creatures seem alive and real. You can see Dobby’s incredibly detailed face up close and understand how they made him so expressive and lovable. It’s incredible to think about all the work that went into making these characters feel like real magical beings.

? The Hogwarts Castle Model – A Grand Finale

End your tour with a breathtaking look at the detailed model used in filming.

Save room in your camera because this finale is stunning. The massive Hogwarts castle model they used for filming is over 50 feet across and has more than 2,500 tiny lights in the windows. When they light it up, it looks exactly like the castle from the movies.

Every single tower, window, and courtyard has been perfectly crafted. As you walk around it, different sections light up while the movie music plays, and honestly, it might make you a bit emotional. This model was used for all those beautiful shots of the castle in the films, and seeing it in person shows you the incredible skill and attention to detail that went into making the Harry Potter movies.