Over the last 12 months, Scruffy Dog’s Design team have been working alongside Merlin Magic Making to conceptualize, develop, master design and manage Drachenzähmen – Die Insel (How To Train Your Dragon – The Island!) Completely re-imaging an existing site space at Merlin’s Heide Park Resort in Germany was the task at hand!
Studying the impressive visual styles and architecture of the Dreamworks masterpiece was something our team worked heavily on with MMM in the early stages of the project. Blending various wooden styles, vibrant paint finishes and weird and wonderful ‘invention-like’ theming, we were able to quickly establish a vision for the Land.
Using the existing landscape of the space on site, we were able to use variants of heights and floor levels to replicate the organic terrain of Berk Island, which also naturally solved some early ride and retail placement issues!
Our team firstly established a language for the land, conceptualizing epic entrance portals, ride theming overlays and how to bring the small details from both the movies and TV show into real life. The land features 3 different ‘flying rides’ that gave guests to opportunity to step into the shoes of a Berk Viking and experience Dragon Training for themselves! The scruffy team had the pleasure of designing some bespoke ride carriages that captured certain species of Dragon and in turn added natural vibrancy to the land.
A focal point for the land was Berk Mountain itself…a 15 metre high themed structure that was also the centre point of the Viking Boat Ride. Using the existing ride layout and producing multiple storyboards, we were able to take adventurers through a short, action packed story, venturing into the dark Dragon Caves to meet and help Hiccup, Toothless and their friends!
Alongside MMM, Scruffy Dog designed every aspect of the land theming in detail, allowing a 3rd party manufacturing company to execute the build efficiently. This also involved working closely with Dreamworks themselves, ensuring that we were staying completely true to their IP in terms of scale, colour and material finishes throughout every stage of the project.
To top it off, we also had the pleasure of designing the lands Retail Area, which we produced a full 3D model replicating Hiccups blacksmith workshop along with a few Dragon surprises!
A fantastic project overall…visit Drachenzähmen – Die Insel at Heide Park Resort to experience Berk for yourself!