Everyone tends to love a good fantasy book, movie or TV series from time to time, just look at the popularity of Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Game of Thrones, Dune or Star Wars. If you love the first franchise then you may want to head to Exeter, UK, towards the end of the month as local company Novelty Bars Ltd will be opening a themed bar called The Cauldron Inn, which will be serving up a magical selection of food and drink, all with pinch of augmented reality (AR).
The pub will be using AR through a specially designed app which will require guests to solve escape room styled clues to earn a discount off drinks orders, as well as meeting witches, wizards, dragons, house elves, sorcerers and casting spells.
The bar and restaurant will open on Exeter’s Gandy Street on Friday, 25th August. The street is rumoured to have been JK Rowlings inspiration behind Diagon Alley. It’ll be housed over four floors with the ground floor featuring moving paintings, chandeliers and a magic mirror where guests can get a print selfie.
The first floor will consist of three rooms. The library which will be stocked will over 1000 books, the Common Room featuring lots of comfy sofas, and the Potion Room with 500+ potions.
Heading further up, the second floor has two themed rooms, the Dragon Room with dragon skulls and knights and the Astronomy Room with crystal balls, magic lights and star signs.
Finally the top floor will will be host to an escape room. Those who want to enter will have to work for the key, as access wil only be granted by collecting all 50 badges awarded in the AR app. Badges can be collected by solving riddles around the bar plus a few located around the city centre.
“It is amazing to open a bar with such a quirky and inspired theme. People love magic and we love people. It is the most exciting project I have worked on,” siad Novelty Bars Ltd to DevonLive.com. “It’s not every day you purchase 1000 books or 500 potion jars or hire a green screen to film moving paintings. If our guests enjoy coming to The Cauldron Inn as much as we’ve enjoyed developing it, we would have done something right”
For further details on The Cauldron Inn head on over to its official Facebook page. And for all the latest AR news from around the world, keep reading VRFocus.