THE new Barbie film has smashed box office records worldwide, with everyone keen to see how director Greta Gerwig brought the childhood toy to life.
However, few people will be aware of the locations that inspired the flamboyant Barbie Land sets, with three of them in the US.
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Set designers Sarah Greenwood and Katie Spencer, who have each been nominated for six Oscars, have revealed some of the places that they looked to build into the streets of Barbie’s perfect-looking world.
With no CGI used for Barbie Land, the whole fantastic plastic world had to be designed and created in real life, with no black, white, or chrome allowed.
The bright pink paradise is loosely based on Palm Springs and is a take on “mid-century California design”.
Greenwood and Spencer told Vogue that Barbie’s Dreamhouse, where Margot Robbie is seen waking up for another perfect day at the beginning of the film, is a “reinterpretation of Richard Neutra’s 1946 Kaufmann House, the property that defined Palm Springs modernist design”.
The desert property, which was immortalised in Slim Aarons’ swimming pool photo ‘Poolside Gossip’, was last on sale two years ago for $16.95 million.
The mid-century architecture of glass walls, Utah stone and open-air rooms inspired thousands of interior copycats.
It also featured in the 2022 film starring Florence Pugh and Harry Styles, Don’t Worry Darling.
Meanwhile, Barbie’s pool was inspired swimming pool at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel in LA, which has a David Hockney mural painted at the bottom of it.
The floor of the vintage 60’s style Tropicana Pool was decorated by the British artist in 1988.
A spokesperson told Hotel Business in 2019: “Legend has it that Mr. Hockney came to The Hollywood Roosevelt one beautiful morning in 1988 with a can of blue paint and a six-inch paint brush tied to a broom handle.
“Over the span of about four hours… he covered it with his signature circular brush strokes. Once the pool was refilled, the art seemingly came to life… weaving and dancing under the sunny Los Angeles sky.”
The hotel itself is the stuff of Hollywood legend – it hosted the first ever Academy awards in 1929 and past guests have included everyone from Marilyn Monroe to Charlie Chaplin.
Although there is no actual water in Barbie Land, with Barbie and her pals simply walking over the top of their pools instead, the bright blue waterless water feature is still an important part of the set design.
Barbie’s pool makes its first appearance at the beginning of the film as the doll makes the most of the slide attached to her Dreamhous, before walking along the top of the glowing blue feature.
The third place that inspired Greenwood and Spencer is a bit more surprising, given that it’s actually a prison.
However, the Naval correctional facility in Seattle, Washington was a big inspiration for the film because of its colour – Baker-Miller pink, the shade used for all the houses and furnishings in Barbieland.
The reason the facility is painted the same colour is because of psychologist Alexander Schauss, who convinced bosses to paint some of the confinement cells pink in an effort to prove certain colours could change human behaviour.
Schauss found that the inmates of the facility were better behaved after exposure to the light shade of pink, which adorns almost every inch of Barbie’s home.
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Although it was inspired by the US, the entirety of Barbie Land was actually built in the UK at Warner Bros Studios at Leavesden in Hertfordshire, where it was also shot.
The Barbie Dreamhouses were said to be more than 25 feet high when they were finished at the studio.
Margot Robbie did all her own stunts in the studio, including jumping from the top of one of the structures.
The studios have been used to film plenty of blockbusters throughout the years, although they’re probably best known for the Harry Potter films.
Visitors can tour some of the sets from the Harry Potter films at the studios, including the Grand Hall, which featured in all of the franchise’s movies.
For those looking to stay somewhere with a full-on Barbie feel, the The Don CeSar aka ‘Pink Palace’ in Florida’s St.Pete, is an impressive pink castle on the white sands of the Gulf of Mexico.
The property, which was once the playground for the rich and famous during the Golden Age of Jazz, has hosted everyone from Al Capone to Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Meanwhile, this stunning UK seaside town is near Hogwarts, with dolphins often seen swimming from the beach.
And this “paradise” UK beach was also a filming locations for some of the Harry Potter films.
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