Last week my family and I had the great experience of going on vacation to Chicago. There are skyscrapers, great restaurants, and many museums but the highlight of our trip was visiting the Museum of Science and Industry. Inside this HUGE museum, I witnessed the first ever Harry Potter exhibit and I was not disappointed in any way.
For any Potter fan, the excitement grows as you approach the museum with incredible huge banners hung up across the entrance of the building. The ground floor where you buy the tickets to get into the museum has the only prop in the entire place that you can take a picture of and that is the flying car from Chamber of Secrets. After a few rounds of escalators you find yourself in front of the entrance of the exhibit and after a walk down a long hallway, you open the doors and are tossed into a whole different realm. Before you actually see the costumes and props from the film, a few volunteers are picked out and sorted by the Sorting Hat seen in several of the films. After a quick film presentation, the walls lift up and you find yourself at Hogwarts Station next to the Hogwarts Express and none other than Rubeus Hagrid is there to greet you. Now you are fully immersed in hundreds of artifacts from all six Harry Potter films.
The exhibit is divided into several areas and the first one is the Gryffindor common room. Here you can find costumes, wands, and accessories owned by the three main characters of the film, Harry, Ron, and Hermione(a few other character's are also featured here.) There are also several moving pictures as well. Next to the common room you can find all the teachers at Hogwarts and things that they use in the film as well including Severus Snape's robes, the giant jack-in-a-box from the third film, and all of Dolores Umbridge's pink accessories.
From there you enter the quidditch area where you can see all the sports robes worn by every character like Victor Krum and Draco Malfoy. People can also step up to a fun interactive exhibit where you can toss a quaffle into the rings seen in all quidditch games. Also in this room is Hagrid's Hut where you can step inside and see all of the half-giants favorite things from all the films including his Giant outfit. You can even sit down in his giant chair that Daniel Radcliffe himself has sat in(OMG chills.)
"First-and understand this Harry 'cause it's very important-not all wizards are good..."(Rubeuus Hagrid.) The third area of this exhibit takes us into the darker realm of the Harry Potter series with things like giant chess pieces, an eerie Dementor and the robes of Lord Voldemort. All things about the Death Eaters and dark objects can be found in this room. This was my personal favorite because it included some of the coolest artifacts from the film and I think they even tried to make this area colder than the others to add to the atmosphere.
The last section of the exhibit is the Great Hall where floating candles, replica's of the food and desert(yummy), and costumes from the Yule Ball as seen in the fourth film were present. The outfits of Albus Dumbledoor, Minerva McGonagall, and Sirius Black can also be seen here. After that you see several more moving pictures and the exhibit sadly comes to a close but the fun is not over. At the end of the exhibition, there is a gift shop that includes merchandise that I'm almost positive can't be found anywhere else(unless you buy it online.) Movie replica's of the characters' wands, the entire Marauder's Map, and a variety of artwork are just a few items up for sale. You can even purchase a replica of the Nimbus 2000 or a Firebolt broomstick(very expensive though.) I personally now own a replica of Voldemort's wand.
I was truly amazed with the Harry Potter Exhibition at the Museum of Science and Industry. I have not even named half of the things that you will see at this exhibit. Near the end of September the exhibit will leave Chicago and travel to Boston but I can't wait till it finds its way n
ear Florida because when it does, I will gladly see it again.
For any Potter fan, the excitement grows as you approach the museum with incredible huge banners hung up across the entrance of the building. The ground floor where you buy the tickets to get into the museum has the only prop in the entire place that you can take a picture of and that is the flying car from Chamber of Secrets. After a few rounds of escalators you find yourself in front of the entrance of the exhibit and after a walk down a long hallway, you open the doors and are tossed into a whole different realm. Before you actually see the costumes and props from the film, a few volunteers are picked out and sorted by the Sorting Hat seen in several of the films. After a quick film presentation, the walls lift up and you find yourself at Hogwarts Station next to the Hogwarts Express and none other than Rubeus Hagrid is there to greet you. Now you are fully immersed in hundreds of artifacts from all six Harry Potter films.
The exhibit is divided into several areas and the first one is the Gryffindor common room. Here you can find costumes, wands, and accessories owned by the three main characters of the film, Harry, Ron, and Hermione(a few other character's are also featured here.) There are also several moving pictures as well. Next to the common room you can find all the teachers at Hogwarts and things that they use in the film as well including Severus Snape's robes, the giant jack-in-a-box from the third film, and all of Dolores Umbridge's pink accessories.
From there you enter the quidditch area where you can see all the sports robes worn by every character like Victor Krum and Draco Malfoy. People can also step up to a fun interactive exhibit where you can toss a quaffle into the rings seen in all quidditch games. Also in this room is Hagrid's Hut where you can step inside and see all of the half-giants favorite things from all the films including his Giant outfit. You can even sit down in his giant chair that Daniel Radcliffe himself has sat in(OMG chills.)
"First-and understand this Harry 'cause it's very important-not all wizards are good..."(Rubeuus Hagrid.) The third area of this exhibit takes us into the darker realm of the Harry Potter series with things like giant chess pieces, an eerie Dementor and the robes of Lord Voldemort. All things about the Death Eaters and dark objects can be found in this room. This was my personal favorite because it included some of the coolest artifacts from the film and I think they even tried to make this area colder than the others to add to the atmosphere.
The last section of the exhibit is the Great Hall where floating candles, replica's of the food and desert(yummy), and costumes from the Yule Ball as seen in the fourth film were present. The outfits of Albus Dumbledoor, Minerva McGonagall, and Sirius Black can also be seen here. After that you see several more moving pictures and the exhibit sadly comes to a close but the fun is not over. At the end of the exhibition, there is a gift shop that includes merchandise that I'm almost positive can't be found anywhere else(unless you buy it online.) Movie replica's of the characters' wands, the entire Marauder's Map, and a variety of artwork are just a few items up for sale. You can even purchase a replica of the Nimbus 2000 or a Firebolt broomstick(very expensive though.) I personally now own a replica of Voldemort's wand.
I was truly amazed with the Harry Potter Exhibition at the Museum of Science and Industry. I have not even named half of the things that you will see at this exhibit. Near the end of September the exhibit will leave Chicago and travel to Boston but I can't wait till it finds its way n
ear Florida because when it does, I will gladly see it again.
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