Follow Harry Potter’s footsteps with Carlyle Crescent haunt

October 21, 2021 · 0 Comments

If you’ve ever wanted to walk in Harry Potter’s footsteps, you don’t have to look for Platform 9 ¾ — just head over to Carlyle Crescent for the Diana family’s annual Halloween Extravaganza.

To say Paul and Su Diana and their children are Halloween enthusiasts might be something of an understatement – and they’re not letting a global pandemic get in the way of their fun.

Gone is the walk-through haunted house and currently under construction are streetscapes so familiar to Harry Potter fans, which will transform their driveway and lawn into a COVID-safe open-air experience.

“We love Halloween and we didn’t want to stop things because of COVID,” says Su. “We know how important it is for the community to still come out and still have things to do. We changed our walk-through, wanting to keep things nice and open and have people be able to flow through, walk on the driveway and see everything.

“Last year was our first year doing Harry Potter, which we all loved. We had amazing feedback from families. Everyone loves Harry Potter – parents and kids – and we heard so many times where parent and kids said, ‘Thanks for doing this. We just read the books to our family a few weeks ago,’ so people were really excited about the Harry Potter theme, but this year we wanted to expand on it and build up sone new things.”

Some new things this year include storefronts familiar to fans of both the books and the movies. The building of each piece is a family affair, with Paul estimating that they put approximately 100 hours a year in just to get it right.

“We have Aragog the spider, I am trying to do a Hagrid skeleton because he was pretty big, the Goblet of Fire with smoke shooting out of it – there are a lot of different parts of the movie we try to incorporate into this,” says Paul. “At nighttime you will see more of a projection mapping onto the house, which is a Harry Potter theme, with some snapshots of the actual movie and other stuff.”

The projections are another new addition this year, which will provide attendees with an almost immersive experience outdoors.

“It helps keep everything outside and in the open so you don’t have to walk through a tight space or anything like that,” says Su.

But are they converts to the open-air concept, or will a walk-through haunted house be a return to normal once the pandemic is behind us? That’s the million-dollar question for the Diana family.

“I am a convert of the open-air concept,” says Paul to a chuckle from Su. “It’s a lot of time with the walk-through, but I like the open air because everyone can see [the effects] on at the same time. There are no restrictions on how many people can go in and there’s a lot of stuff when you’re doing the actual walk-through and to store the props.”

“I might throw up a tent one year when things are okay, but we’re going with the flow and last year everyone was super-respectful of the space,” adds Su, not prepared to commit to a fully open-air future!

The Diana family will welcome visitors to their open-air experience at 40 Carlyle Crescent in Aurora’s southwest on evenings from October 29 – 31.

There is no charge for admission but donations to the Aurora Food Pantry are encouraged.

“We have been asking the community to donate to the Food Pantry and we have been successful in previous years in bringing at least a couple of trucks,” says Su. “We are definitely asking for that support from our community and thankfully the community always comes out and brings a lot of good things for the Food Pantry.

“At the end of the day, it is all about the comments we get from the community and the excitement we see with the kids. Some of the kids in previous years got really super-scared, but they were okay, had fun and wanted to come back. For me, it is how can I create an experience for the community so they can just come around the corner and see something? The Food Pantry drive is very near and dear to our hearts, but this is our creative outlet. By November 1, we’re already at Spirit Halloween thinking of themes. We’re always trying to plan out something cool to do for the community.”

By Brock Weir
Editor
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter