Studio Ghibli swung open the doors of its amusement park late last year, giving anime fans in Japan the opportunity to see some of the beautiful anime locales brought to the real world for the first time. While Howl’s Moving Castle will have a place in the amusement park’s borders, the animated film that focused on a young girl with aging issues, a mysterious sorcerer, and a walking domicile has made its way to another country as a real-world recreation has arrived in France.
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One of Ghibli’s biggest moves of the last year was the opening of its amusement park which features locales not just based on Howl’s Moving Castle, but also Princess Mononoke, Spirited Away, My Neighbor Totoro, and many other legendary films that arrived from the prolific animation studio. Currently, the studio remains hard at work on their next movie, How Do You Live?, which will adapt a classic Japanese novel that arrived in the early 1900s and will, presumably, be the last film from director Hayao Miyazaki as he plans to retire following the movie’s completion. While there have been no plans to expand the theme park to North America, this latest showing with the walking castle shows that the studio could still bring recreations to the West.
Howl’s France Castle
Studio Ghibli took the opportunity to share the Howl’s Moving Castle balloon that was erected in France as part of a partnership with Loewe, the fashion producers that are looking to create a new line that focuses on the magical story which remains a fan-favorite to this day:
Ghibli also took the opportunity to share some of the wild designs for the upcoming line, which sees one of the adorable canines from Howl’s Moving Castle transformed into a purse:
Ghibli isn’t the only anime attraction in Japan, as Universal Studios in the country continues to create anime-themed rides and locales based on popular franchises including Jujutsu Kaisen, Hunter x Hunter, Attack on Titan, and many others. With Super Mario Wolrd recently making the jump from East to West, perhaps we’ll see some anime attractions do the same at some point in the future.
What do you think of this balloon bringing Howl’s home to the real world? Feel free to let us know in the comments or hit me up directly on Twitter @EVComedy to talk all things comics, anime, and the world of Studio Ghibli.
