Game of Thrones Studio Tour officially opens to the public

Game of Thrones stars Isaac Hempstead Wright (Bran Stark), Kristian Nairn (Hodor) and Nathalie Emmanuel (Missandei) were on hand today to officially open the doors of the Game of Thrones Studio Tour, which is essentially a Game of Thrones museum built in Linen Mill Studios in Northern Ireland, where the show did a lot of actual shooting. That means that some of the sets available for fans to check out — including the Great Hall of Winterfell and Castle Black — aren’t just recreations, but the actual sets where the actors shot scenes for years, unmoved since they were last in use.

Visitors will get to explore 110,000 square feet of Game of Thrones goodness, each corner packed with with props and costumes from the show, including Jon Snow’s sword Longclaw and Sansa Stark’s wedding dress. Folk can even sit on a replica of the Iron Throne if they like. There are also interactive workshops and live re-enactments of makeup, prosthetics and costume sessions.

“It will blow the fans away, I’m absolutely certain of that,” said actor Ian Beattie, who played Meryn Trant; he was at the museum earlier this week. “I was involved in the Game of Thrones series experience, which I thought was fantastic, but this blows it out of the water, everything that people will see during this studio tour, these were the outfits we used, those were the swords, the props, that was the set we walked on.”

How Game of Thrones impacted Northern Ireland

Beattie, a Northern Irish native, also talked about the effect the show had on the area. “When Game of Thrones came to this province to start filming here, it was the biggest gift ever given to this province, HBO spent 250 million over eight seasons and that was just the direct cost of making the show,” he said.

"In 2018, 300,000 people spent 50 million pounds in this province specifically to come and see Game of Thrones attractions around the north coast, Belfast, etc. And now they have a permanent exhibition, it’s the gift that keeps on giving and it has turned into one of the leading film and television locations in the world. We now have crews that can vie with anybody in the world."

Time to plan a vacation…

You can find more information on the Game of Thrones Studio Tour and buy tickets here.

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h/t Variety