Buddy the Elf's journey from the North Pole to New York City is getting a limited holiday-season attraction this year. The Elf Experience, an immersive attraction inspired by the 2003 holiday classic, opens Nov. 14 at HERO, the subterranean venue beneath Rockefeller Center, and will run through Jan. 18.
The experience walks guests through key settings from the film, including Papa Elf's storybook, the Candy Cane Forest, Santa's Workshop and the fictional Gimbels department store, according to NBC Los Angeles. Visitors can expect interactive activities, photo opportunities and holiday treats including candy, candy canes, candy corn and syrup — a nod to Buddy's four main food groups. Tickets range from $35 to $49 and are available at elftheexperience.com, with children under 2 admitted free.
A Filmmaker Behind the Camera and the Concept
The attraction was created by Fairview Portals, the company founded by Elf director Jon Favreau, in collaboration with Warner Bros. Global Experiences. Favreau said miniature work, forced perspective, zoetrope and animatronics were all implemented to create a unique and handcrafted experience meant to capture the spirit of the film — a hands-on approach that echoes the director's original filmmaking style. Favreau famously avoided computer-generated imagery in the 2003 movie, relying instead on practical forced perspective, stop-motion animation and physical puppets to emulate classic Rankin/Bass holiday specials, as noted by Collider.
Simon Robinson, president of global experiences and worldwide studio operations at Warner Bros. Discovery, said watching Elf has become a holiday tradition for millions of fans and that Rockefeller Center is synonymous with the holidays in New York City. Bringing Elf and Rockefeller Center together, he said, gives fans an entirely new way to immerse themselves in the Elf story.
The Sleigh Makes Its Return to Manhattan
Among the attraction's centerpieces is the screen-used sleigh from the film. The prop includes the film's Kringle 3000 jet engine and Clausometer gauge. It last appeared in Manhattan in December 2023, when it traveled from the Halesite Fire Department in Huntington, Long Island, to Fifth Avenue.
That one-ton, 17-foot sleigh has an unusual local history of its own. A private donor bought it at a 2003 online auction for $12,000 and gave it to the volunteer firefighters in Halesite, who have maintained it for more than two decades, according to CBS New York. Moving the prop into Manhattan reportedly requires a police escort.
Gimbels, Elf and a Bit of New York Retail Nostalgia
The film's depiction of Gimbels as Buddy's workplace taps into real department-store history. While the exterior of the fictionalized Gimbels was filmed at Manhattan's Textile Building at 295 Fifth Avenue, the interior retail scenes were actually shot inside the cafeteria of a former psychiatric hospital in Vancouver, Canada, per Business Insider. The real Gimbels operated as Macy's primary Manhattan retail rival for 76 years before closing in 1986, 17 years before Elf hit theaters.
Elf also got a Times Square moment last December, when Warner Bros. held a Dec. 12 celebration that included pop-up photo stations and a performance from the cast of Elf the Musical. The franchise has continued to expand well beyond the original film, including a 2010 Broadway musical adaptation and a 2014 NBC stop-motion television special, Elf: Buddy's Musical Christmas, which featured Jim Parsons voicing Buddy, according to Time Out.
Another Draw for a Record Holiday Season
The Elf Experience joins a growing lineup of activations inside HERO, the 17,000-square-foot former U.S. Post Office facility that MATTE Projects converted into a permanent immersive-storytelling venue at the Rink Level beneath the Channel Gardens, according to Untapped New York. The space previously hosted reSOUND New York and a two-day sensory hair-care pop-up called The OGXperience, which Hoodline covered in late August.
The timing lines up with a surge in projected visitors to New York City this winter. New York City Tourism + Conventions has projected that 8.1 million global visitors will travel to the city during the late autumn and winter holiday season. Rockefeller Center alone can draw between 500,000 and 800,000 visitors a day during peak holiday weeks, fueled largely by its Christmas Tree and outdoor ice rink, per NYC Tourism.
