MYSTICAL IRELAND
has been preening like a peacock since its Titanic Studios captured the Kingdom of Westeros within its interior. Located in the burgeoning Titanic Quarter, the 110,000square-foot studio is one of Europe’s biggest and, since its continued use in all five seasons of “Game of Thrones,” has become one of the city’s shiniest new additions.
As of today you can’t visit inside the Titanic Studios, though that may change, and the HBO traveling prop and costume exhibit may come back there later this year.
The Titanic Studios are where all of “Game of Thrones” interior scenes are filmed. Props, statues, costumes, even jewelry are often created by local craftspeople.
King Joffrey and his queenfor-a-day Margaery’s crowns, for instance, were made by Antrim jewelry craftspeople, Steensons Goldsmiths. The family owned company’s main headquarters in Glenarm on the Antrim Coast now houses an “économusée,” or working museum, where you can watch artisans hard at work on pieces for their upcoming “Game of Thrones” collection as well as more traditional pieces. A “Game of Thrones” red wedding ring, anyone?
Northern Irish sculptor Darren Sutton has worked with the studios on some exquisite set pieces. Strangely, his massive “Game of Thrones”-like sea god sculpture, Manannán Mac Lir, which once overlooked a promontory on Binevenagh Mountain near Limavady in County Londonderry (another scene of new location filming) was mysteriously stolen this January and replaced with a cross. A note was left that said, “Thou shalt have no other gods before me.” Locals, however, have determined to repair the recently recovered statue.
Pilgrims can also visit Northern Ireland’s other breathtakingly mystic sites, including UNESCO-protected bucket list sublimities like the famous Giant’s Causeway — a massive landscape of over 40,000 prehistoric basalt columns licked by the sea.
Then there are the fairy forts, or raths. There are about 45,000 prehistoric raths all over Ireland and Northern Ireland. A recent ripping-up of fairy circles around Ireland’s heritage Tara site has resulted in what some say is a rash of bad luck for the government officials in charge of the damage. . .
How right that Westeros decided to make this its home.