THE SKETCH WAS DONE IN just a few minutes, off the cuff—but as any Harry Potter fan can see, its accuracy is uncanny. "I was curious— honestly, desperate—to know anything about the nature of Hogwarts [J.K. Rowling] could pass on," says Stuart Craig, production designer on every Harry Potter and Fantastic Beasts film so far. "In a page of her notebook, she started [drawing] in the top left-hand corner and worked her way down to the right-hand corner, producing this map." The result speaks for itself.
The map covers all of Hogwarts and nearby Hogsmeade village, as well as the train station used by Hogwarts Express; it's essentially a blueprint for how students navigated Rowling's imagined world. Craig subsequently visited inspiration campuses, like Oxford, to flesh out the vision. No matter how much detail the books featured—and, indeed, Rowling was certainly vivid— this simple sketch can be credited with bringing the Wizarding World to life. "It kicked me off with a privileged start," Craig says enthusiastically.