The Spider-Man: Far From Home filming locations throw one very New York superhero into a totally different world. Did you identify Piazza San Marco, Charles Bridge, the Tower of London… and the local destinations you’ve got to know, to know?
Where Was Spider-Man: Far From Home Filmed?
Spider-Man: Far From Home was filmed at Leavesden Studios in Hertfordshire and on location in London, Venice, Prague and Spain. The must-see landmarks are all there, along with a few surprises.
To the world it’s Tower Bridge (unless you’ve been calling it London Bridge – an error that’s pulled up in Far From Home). But to locals it’s part of Tower Hamlets, and the neighbourhood makes an appearance too.
For the chaos that strikes the carnival of light in Prague, the production headed to a neighbouring town. And when it comes to secret hideouts, North London and Hertfordshire are the places to be.
It turns out some cast members got a better deal than others though. As the Midtown school trip crowd navigate Europe in the midst of a monster problem, the tourist scenes were largely filmed on location.
“Jake and Samuel never left London. They never went to Prague or Venice. That’s why we had to do some really tricky things.”
Claude Paré, Production Designer
Despite all the location filming, the finished product is a blend of location, VFX and clever set building on a vast scale. When it comes to action-packed scenes, you won’t believe the layers of creativity that made it all happen.
Only the intro and ending were shot in NYC.
"We've made a lot of movies that take place in Manhattan, and there's a lot of movies of Peter swinging through the city,"
Amy Pascal, Producer
In other words, Tom Holland’s incarnation of Spider-Man is going somewhere new. We’ve seen those shots before, and since the third live-action reboot is up and running it’s time for a fresh playground.
Though if you stayed for the Madison Square Garden sequence, you’ll know Zendaya’s MJ added her own spirit to the classic webs-across-Manhattan routine.
Mexico
Old town of Belchite - ecelan [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/)]
This Spider-Man: Far From Home Mexico filming location is Belchite, a Spanish town with an upsetting past.
The Earth Elemental devastates a Mexican town within the movie’s early scenes. It’s a total contrast to Peter Parker’s life of school buddies and fundraising appearances, but we all know these worlds are about to collide.
Mysterio’s first sequence was shot with chroma, blending footage from Leavesden with the Spanish filming location, but the ruins are all too real.
Far From Home’s filming location is Belchite in Aragon which was destroyed in the 1930s. The church seen in the sequence is the town’s Church of St Augustine.
3000 residents were killed when General Franco ordered an attack on the Republican stronghold. It was Franco himself who ordered it to be preserved as a monument to the might of the Nationalists. The handful of survivors were rehoused in a new Belchite nearby.
By today’s standards, it’s a chilling memorial to the battle.
The unique appearance of the ghost town has attracted interest from filmmakers over the past decades. Scenes from Pan’s Labyrinth were filmed at the Zaragoza town, making a poignant connection with the film’s Spanish Civil War setting.
Newark Airport
Stansted Airport. Ralf Roletschek (talk) - Fahrradtechnik auf fahrradmonteur.de [FAL or GFDL 1.2 (http://www.gnu.org/licenses/old-licenses/fdl-1.2.html)]
Did Spider-Man: Far From Home film at Newark Airport? They did use a couple of shots of the airport building in New Jersey, but Tom Holland, Zendaya and the rest of the school trip cast shot scenes closer to the movie’s Leavesden base.
They crossed London to film at Stansted Airport. Look out for the terminal’s forecourt when the school group are shown at Newark. And there’s a shot you might assume was captured at Newark, featuring the United Airlines Boeing 777 – in fact, the jet was brought to Stansted’s airfield.
“The Spider-Man crew filmed… at a number of locations around the airport, including the airfield and terminal which they dressed to depict Newark airport. The crew brought in yellow cabs and other American vehicles, they even swapped the rubbish inside the waste bins to American litter.”
Kim Ruskin, Commercial Filming Manager at Stansted Airport
Stansted offers direct flights to the US, so if you’re planning a trip to Spider-Man’s New York hometown this is a good place to start the trip!
It’s actually not the only Spider-Man filming location in Essex, but it’s the only one you’ll remember from the movie. More Far From Home scenes were shot nearby in Bishop’s Stortford though didn’t make the final cut.
The unused footage follows Peter Parker getting ready for his European trip. They’re set to appear in a featurette, so look out for the Essex town on the Blu-ray!
Venice
How much of that action-packed Spider-Man: Far From Home Venice sequence was filmed on location in the Italian city?
You’ll never guess. Smart VFX mixed with location footage layers up a realistic picture of the island city, but the scale of the Leavesden sets is nothing short of incredible.
“When Nick Fury and Peter Parker travel through the canal, that whole boat ride was shot on a sound stage against a green screen. Then we went to Italy, filmed other boats on the canals and did some [photographic] plates for the background”
Claude Paré, Production Designer
Not only did the production team recreate a Venetian canal with gondolas imported straight from the lagoon. A team of 125 recreated a sizeable part of the Rialto Bridge, the Embankment and the famous market.
You could be forgiven for mistaking it for the real thing though. Sculptors and painters handcrafted the stonework and aged it to replicate one of the world’s most recognisable structures on the Hertfordshire backlot.
Then VFX unleashed the worst of the chaos. But the team added some practical Elemental damage to Venice’s Calle Giazzo and Campo Santa Maria del Formosa too. They upturned tables and chairs, and generally made a mess, which you can see in the next sequence.
As you probably guessed, a lot of the touristy school trip scenes were filmed at the real deal, including Piazza San Marco (St Mark’s Square)
The flooded hotel isn’t far from the truth. Acqua alta, the flooding causes by high tides and a sinking city, hits the city each year. When the tide comes up, platforms are raised across Piazza San Marco and other major routes.
It’s not unusual to see shopkeepers or hotel staff putting down mats and sweeping floodwater from doorways.
Prague
Vinohrady Theatre. I, Ondřej Žváček [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/)]
Spider-Man: Far From Home Prague scenes were shot in the Czech Republic’s capital city at the end of September 2018.
The grand former bank building sits in the heart of the Nové Město (New Town) against a backdrop of the city’s ancient squares and Prague Castle.
Carlo IV hotel is certainly an excellent upgrade. You can probably appreciate the ambience better if your tour group hasn’t been caught up in a battle between Elementals and superheroes though.
Look out for shots of the students lounging in the lobby. The hotel’s 152 rooms were each designed by Maurizio Papiri, and they’re the last word in luxury but they’re not actually the ones seen onscreen.
Shots of the rooms were filmed back in the UK.
The carnival of light is a real thing, though it’s not exactly as it seems in the movie. Prague’s Signal Festival draws on old traditions and the hottest contemporary art every October.
But the geography isn’t strictly accurate.
The battle between Mysterio and Hellfire was filmed on location in Liberec, an hour’s drive from Prague.
Locals will recognise Liberec town square and the green-capped Neo-Renaissance building of Liberec Town Hall.
Footage was captured on location, and the square was partially recreated on the Leavesden backlot.
Far From Home’s opera house location, the Vinohrady Theatre, really is found in Prague though.
The Vinohrady Theatre (Divadlo na Vinohradech) has hosted all the big names in Czech theatre since it was built in 1902. In recent years, it’s also played host to Hollywood stars – Spider-Man isn’t the first production to showcase this elegant theatre.
Rewatch the Edward Norton and Jessica Biel film The Illusionist and you might recognise the Vinohrady Theatre is used as a Vienna theatre filming location.
Book a show and you’ll see the grand columns of the exterior, and the auditorium where Peter makes a tough call about MJ.
Additional footage of the carnival was filmed around the castle, Nerudova Street and its steps, and the Charles Bridge.
We see the famous bridge a second time clearly when MJ and Peter have a turning-point conversation.
If you aren’t into European architecture but the Charles Bridge looks familiar, chances are you recognise it from a Tom Cruise favourite. It’s one of the most noticeable Mission: Impossible filming locations, and just one of the backdrops that shows off this photogenic city.
Nick Fury’s Czech Castle
Hatfield House. Allan Engelhardt [CC BY-SA 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)]
The filming location for Nick Fury’s Czech Castle is on the doorstep of Leavesden. Hatfield House has appeared in period dramas like The Favourite and The Crown, and much more besides. In fact, chances are that if you’re a cinema fan you’ve seen its rooms at some point.
But this isn’t its first comic book turn. It appeared as Wayne Manor in Batman way back in 1989. When Christopher Nolan rebooted the DC franchise in 2005, he returned to Hatfield but kept clear of the main house – only the grounds made it into the movie.
Mysterio’s Workshop
Alexandra Palace. John Bointon [CC BY-SA 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)]
The theatre filming location where Mysterio’s crew test their drones is the long-forgotten Alexandra Palace Theatre.
Until recently is was sealed off in eerie silence.
Built in the 1870s, it once put on plays, ballets and concerts for audiences of 3000 every night. As the spotlight moved to the West End, it was adapted as a cinema until the doors closed in the 1930s.
From 1935 onwards, Ally Pally was the first home of BBC TV. They used the theatre as a rather grand carpentry workshop, before pitching it as a revolutionary studio space.
But by the late 1960s they had upped sticks to bigger studios. Though it wasn’t damaged in the fire that swept Alexandra Palace in 1980, bringing the mothballed theatre back to its former glory wasn’t on the agenda either.
The unusual atmosphere of this reclaimed theatre hidden that was hidden in plain sight for so long, makes it a great setting for the Far From Home scene.
Final Battle in London
Tower Bridge. © User:Colin / Wikimedia Commons
Apart from Spider-Man, who takes a different route, the students arrive at St Pancras International Station. Onscreen, you see the platforms inside and the familiar red building when they exit onto Euston Road.
We love this kind of location filming – it’s exactly where you arrive from Paris, and it’s the kind of journey real people make every day. But we’re happy to leave out the part about the questionable tour bus.
You can’t miss the Tower Bridge, the Tower of London, the Shard and City Hall as the next London Far From Home filming locations. Tower Bridge Wharf was at the centre of the location shoot.
“Tower Bridge Wharf supplied the perfect backdrop in which to conclude the film, offering fantastic views of Tower Bridge, The Thames and City Hall”
Film Officer for Tower Hamlets, Olwyn Hinds
The production didn’t just fly in and shoot around the big landmarks though. They got out and about to use ‘real’ locations off the beaten track as well.
York Hall is a Georgian building on Old Ford Road, but the interior’s vintage look harks back to the 1920s when it was redeveloped as a leisure centre.
The fitness complex is still going strong, and over the years it’s earned a reputation as the home of British boxing.
It’s just around the corner from another filming location, Bethnal Green’s Raines Foundation Lower School.
Now, let’s take a closer look at those big hitters from the finale sequence. Nick Fury and Maria Hill stay on the edge of the action for a lot of the movie, including the big London showdown.
Samuel L Jackson filmed the scenes with Cobie Smulders around St Katharine’s Docks and Tower Bridge in September 2018.
Unless you pass the area regularly, you might not instantly recognise the office blocks they’re walking through. They’re part of the newly developed business district at Moretown, bordering Wapping’s growing tech community.
Centred around the 1980s Thomas More Square, the area has been given a facelift that fits this century’s campus model.
Happy saves Peter’s friends by leading them into the Tower of London, with a mixture of location shooting and creative license. The exterior shots are spot-on.
But it probably won’t surprise you to learn that the real Crown Jewels weren’t front and centre in an action sequence.
Far From Home gives the impression they’re kept in the White Tower. The cabinets filled with armour give the right impression, but the Crown Jewels are kept in specially engineered Jewel Tower. Visitors glide past them on a moving walkway to keep the crowds moving.
The crew only had five minutes to capture shots of a totally clear Tower Bridge, so it was all captured in minute detail. Like so many other sequences in the movie, it’s part of a complex puzzle that takes in an element of the location.
Up at the top of Tower Bridge, the glass walkway is taken straight from the real thing. Obviously a fair amount of VFX were needed to pull off the drone-ridden scene.
If you visit the real glass floor, you can test some effects of your own. Visitors can download an augmented reality app that lets you experience the bridge in a whole new way.
And that’s exactly what Spider-Man: Far From Home shows audiences too – one of the most iconic London landmarks from a different point of view. Though you might remember it from the first series of The Apprentice UK...