Hogwarts is a place of magic and wonder. It is more than just a school. It is alive, filled with hidden treasures, amazing sights and vistas to inspire child like awe. Canon gives us the enchanted ceiling of the Great Hall, the moving staircases, the talking paintings, the Room of Requirement and much else besides. But what else is there?

I thought it would be interesting if we brainstormed some original 'awe' for Hogwarts. The purpose of this thread: come up with hidden treasures for Hogwarts. They don't have to be grand or impressive. They don't need to shake the world. They just need to capture the glee, magic and wonder that so infused the Harry Potter books.

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My first contribution...

Old Professor Hubbard is a herb garden growing in one of Hogwarts many courtyards. The bed forms the outline of an old witch and the plants make up the rest of the picture. Most of the time the picture is imperfect. The shadows never quite line up to make features and the plants are never quite in the right stage of bloom. The exception is one day in mid spring.

On that day and on the right hour, the sun is in just the right spot in the sky and the flowers are in just the right state of growth. The picture is perfect and Old Professor Hubbard comes alive.

Much as wizarding portraits can move, talk and think, for that single hour Old Professor Hubbard can move, talk and think. She is known to give good advice to students who seek her out and always lends a ear to those who need to talk. Her time lapsed life gives her a long memory and she can speak on things forgotten to many others, even the ancient ghosts who walk Hogwarts' halls.

 

Okay, first let me say that this is a fantastic idea.

I would contribute the `summer spot`. Scotland is not the warmest place to live and an old stone castle not great at keeping the heat either. Sure, the students gather in the winter months in the common room around the fireplace to laugh and chat and enjoy themselves, but what if someone wants some peace and quiet without freezing to death?

So in a quiet corner in Hogwarts exists a comfy little corner where the students can retreat to if they seek a secluded spot to read their favorite book or just to relax after a stressful schoolday. The magic involved? There`s always light falling trough the nearby window lighten the spot with warm summer light. In this little corner is the summer never over. Bright light and a cloudless, beautiful sky can be spotted through this one specific window. For students who miss the bright summer sky it is their little heaven and it warms up not only their body but also their heart that aches for the clear blue sky during the cold, dark winter days.

 

Under the sea/lake.

A permanent underwater dome/bubble in the lake accessible from a underground path.

Used for some Herbology classes, care of magical creatures and picnics.

 

I do like the idea of picnicking under the water, a distorted sun glimmering above while fish swing on all sides.

 

Despite of the common misunderstanding, Hogwarts as we know it today was not built by the four founders. Instead, the castle has been expanded, renovated, accidentally demolished, damaged in battles and built anew over the centuries, with new towers and wings being built and removed as needed. For example the whole northern section was largely rebuilt and expanded during the baby boom that followed the great dragon-flu epidemic in the late 17th century.

During that rebuilding one section of the old castle was simply lost. Because of the wide-spread use of newly discovered space-warping magics, the old Alchemy department that used to be situated in the 3rd floor of the old structure disappeared. The new, magically shortened stairway that was built for the expanded section went from the old second floor straight to the new third floor which was built on top of the old one, and as Alchemy had went out of fashion soon after Nicholas Flamel's discovery of the Philosopher's Stone (and the consecutive goblin rebellion that resulted in outlawing the creation of gold with one), no one noticed that anything was amiss until Flamel came to act as a visiting professor three decades later and wondered where the alchemy department was situated.

Extensive searches were conducted on the area based on the written records that indicated where the department had been located, and eventually the sealed off department was found by a member of the Ravenclaw Quidditch team, who noticed an extra row of windows between the second and what was thought to be the third floor. No entrance could be found from the inside of the castle though, and the so called "Floor Two and Three Quarters" remains a hideout for those quidditch players who know how to find it.

 

The Hall of Windows
The Hall of Windows is a narrow but winding corridor, leading from the Great Hall to the Gargoyle statue on the second floor. It is filled with thousands of windows of every shape and size, from dinner plates to doors. The windows cover both the walls and ceiling, and in places even the floor.

Every exterior window in Hogwarts Castle has a bewitched twin in the Hall of Windows. Looking through a Hall of Windows window, a student sees the grounds surrounding Hogwarts, as if he was looking out the twinned external window.

If the windows are arranged in any order, it is a arcane and chaotic one. The twin to a north facing tower porthole might be next to a southern dormer. More, the windows are arranged at every angle and orientation. This makes walking the Hall of Windows a dizzying affair as the view twists and shifts with every step.

 

Well this is technically a necropost but this is actually a cool thread so fuck it.

The Shy Tower

Hogwarts has many towers, (few of which can actually be observed) including one tower only viewable on the August the 27th, one upside down, and one at the bottom of the black lake.

One of the strangest is the Shy Tower. It was created when a Hufflepuff attempted to actually jettison an emotion, his chronic shyness which had been holding him back in class, into a physical object. Surprising absolutely everyone involved (including the atudent himself) the spell actually worked, and what is now known as the Shy Tower can be found constantly hiding behind the other towers of Hogwarts. If enough people happen to be looking at that direction, the tower will even move itself into the school itself, hiding in the lower depths of the building until someone finds it.

 

A long time ago a particularly mad potions professor was studying gnomes and experimenting on them, but eventually he got tired of trying to make intelligent gnomes and released them accidentally when he was older and turned senile.

These gnomes have since then lived in a small subset of the dungeons in a colony that's able to use tools, on the border of being advanced but still quite primitive. The last time they were discovered by a student in the 1800's who was quite shocked to find gnomes that could speak a bit of english with quite thick scottish accents. They call themselves MacDougal's Pictsies over a miscommunication made so long ago with that professor.

The next time they're found again, who knows how much more advanced they'll be?

 

Morgana’s Cauldron:
In the lowest levels of Hogwarts’ dungeons, down ancient stairs, under the sullen orange light of ever-lit tallow candles, is Morgana’s Cauldron.

This ancient store room holds rotten barrel frames and old, decomposing artefacts from the Middle Ages, shape more from the moss and lichen that overcame it than from any damp, sludgy structure in its once magical remains.

The spiral stair is damp, and slick, the air is full of water moisture. The steps are worn and the slabs of the dungeon’s limestone floor are cold, with depressions full of water.

Past an arch, opposite the only door, the floor gives way to rough, sloping sandstone, granular and coming apart. It sinks down into a deep channel through which passes a torrential waterfall. Ceiling to floor. Thunderous, the roar of all its dark water, in such little light, black to the eye. Where it goes, no-one says. But students note that it is a little harder to cast magic, the closer to the cauldron they get. Incantations needing to be a little more crisp, wand-movements ever more precise. Spells coming out more dimly, more washed-out, all the same.

 

I was scrolling and misread this thread's title as "The Wormholes of Hogwarts"

So, The Wormholes of Hogwarts are small magical gateways hidden throughout the castle, which lead to all sorts of random places.

They also like to change their destinations every once in a while. Sometimes you might emerge inside the Hogwarts Lake, sometimes in the middle of the Forbidden Forest, the 7th Year Girls' Bathroom in Slytherin or even Hogsmeade, you never really know.

Supposedly some animals like cats or dogs can sense where each wormhole leads by instinct alone. Mrs Norris almost always finds students breaking rules.

 

This idea is @Niez's who had the idea of wizard graveyards, generally. Then we discussed how it might look at Hogwarts, specifically.

Wandsrest Corner:

Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry sits atop its southerly Lake, across the water from Hogsmeade village. From the courtyard, the drive extends north to the castle gates, at the far ends of the grounds, where the path then turns and traces the whole castle again, to that neighbouring, magical village.

Hogwarts grounds are always busy with racing children. The Quidditch Pitch is set into the lowest depression, down the hill, on the west lawn; and the Forbidden Forest, covering the school's boundary to the East draws braver Gryffindors toward it on brighter days. Closer to the castle, the forest pulls back, with the lawnspace between given over to Professor Sprout's greenhouses. With classes, and breaks, and matches, and rowing on the lake, it can look like there's never a quiet moment at Hogwarts Castle.

Still, there is a little piece of quiet, hidden away in a place few pupils visit. A peaceful, melancholic place for those unfortunate students and dignified Professors who enjoyed their final days at the school. Wandsrest Corner.

Sitting in the south-west corner of the grounds, hidden from view of the Quidditch Pitch by the trailing leg of Hogwarts' Great Hall, Wandsrest Corner is a garden walled around in clean red-brick, covered over by ivy, and surrounded by holly. At its back sits one great yew tree, and in the summer, creepers flower a beautiful purple all over the wall. Even the weeds grow green, and pretty, before they're pruned.

In Wandsrest Corner, students and family come to pay their final respect. Humble gravestones to grand mausoleums, each shimmers with happy memories. Memories of the dearly departed charmed to repeat endlessly over the stone. Loved ones will commonly place a fresh memory on the grave, and see it come again at their next visit, and over time the memory will change and bloom, just like the flowers surrounding it, becoming more vivid, bright, and real.

The sound of the lake's lapping waves reaches Wandsrest Corner very well, while the loudness of the School is quieted here. There are benches. Stay as long as you'd like.

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(if this inspires you to share your own thing, great, this thread's dope. If you have a non-location based thing to add, there's the Fleshing out Hogwarts Thread, which might use some love)

 

Gryffindor's Armoury

There is one room on the ground floor whose door is always locked. None can enter it: wizard, witch, or elf. The mystery of the door remained unsolved for generations until one morning, desperate to think of something to beat his closest friend turned most dangerous enemy, a young Albus Dumbledore opened the door by mistake. Full of determination and a desire to save his countrymen at all costs, Dumbledore stepped inside the room, his attention elsewhere, before he realised it was not a room he'd ever been in before.

Filled to the brim with weapons both magical and muggle, the room practically bristled with power. The magic of the room whet Dumbledore's determination and sharpened his bravery, leading him past the tower shield, the magical cannon, and the ornate broadsword towards a single red feather tied to a small piece of string. And as he picked it up, Dumbledore just knew what he had to do. He kept that knowledge, heartened by the fact that he had one secret weapon against his old friend. A few weeks later, in what would have been his final moment on Earth, he threw that feather into the path of a killing curse fired by Gellert Grindelwald. Feather and curse collided, and an unearthly, beautiful song filled the air. The battlefield paused as one and the cry of a phoenix rang through the battlefield, bolstering Albus's allies and filling his enemies with dread.

The armoury would never open for him again.

It opened again, decades later during a school lockdown, when one brave Gryffindor accepted his fate, gathered his courage, and spoke out against the shade of a fallen Dark Lord in the heart of enemy territory. Fawkes the phoenix would swoop in with the Sorting Hat, gather the Sword of Gryffindor in it, and fly away into the heart of Slytherin's power to help build the legend of Harry Potter anew.

The Armoury lay unopened for five more years, until Neville Longbottom looked at Lord Voldemort in the eye to defy him, just as his parents had done thrice earlier. How the sword got into the hat would never be known, for it was not in the Armoury at that time nor was it in the hat, but Neville Longbottom would forever swear that his hands moved on their own accord to grip the sword and cleave the snake in twain. And the Bloody Baron would swear up and down until his eventual exorcism that he saw the Spirit of Godric Gryffindor wield his sword against the last scion of Salazar Slytherin that day.

 

Spoiler: First Day Back

"Hey — hey, you lot! Midgets!"

"Ron!"

"Well, they are, they’re titchy …"

"I know, but you can’t call them midgets! — First Years!" Hermione called along the table. "This way, please!"

As they guided the First Years up to the Gryffindor Common Room, Ron looked down at his new prefect badge to make sure it was still fastened to his robes, and, to some extent, to make sure it was still real. He used his sleeve to give it a quick polish, then realized how Percy-ish this made him look and hastily smudged it with his thumb.

"The marble staircase is a defining feature of the Great Hall," Hermione said as they climbed it, "conjured by Rowena Ravenclaw herself in the year 989. The runes that she carved into the stairs are said to reinvigorate students, who might be feeling sleepy and sluggish, as they're climbing down into the Great Hall to get them excited for their upcoming classes. I know I often feel a burst of energy as I'm heading down in the morning."

"Yeah, me too," Ron said with a snort, "heading down to double Potions always gets me all jazzed up."

Some of the eleven-year-olds giggled, and Hermione scowled.

"Er, anyway," Ron said, "I think Rowena Ravenclaw had a sense of fun, too, if she's the one responsible for this." He hopped up on the bannister and slid up, all the way to the top of the staircase, where he jumped off with ease. A few of the First Years applauded, and Ron, grinning, couldn't decide whether this was embarrassing or gratifying. "Up-sliding bannister. Bet you won't find that in Hogwarts, A History."

"Actually," said Hermione dryly, "you will. In fact, it was Rowena Ravenclaw's daughter, Helena, who managed the charms for that."

"Hm. Maybe the sense of fun skips a generation. Oi — watch out!" He grabbed one over-eager student by the collar of his robes to keep him from toppling over the side of the bannister. "Yeah, sometimes it helps to have a running start, should've explained that."

"Ron, for heaven's sake!"

They continued their way up to the common room, when one of the smallest girls suddenly shrieked.

"Is that a banshee?" She looked terrified as she pointed at a portrait with a shaking hand. The woman in the painting opened her mouth, and over half the crowd squealed and covered their ears, anticipating the long, unearthly sound of the banshee's wailing shriek.

Hermione and Ron stood there calmly, waiting for the others to uncover their ears. Another girl tentatively pried one eye open and began to relax. "We can't hear her?"

"Nope," Ron said, watching the banshee in the portrait shriek silently, clutching her green-tinged face as she swayed slowly on the spot.

"Well," Hermione corrected, "we can hear her. We just can't hear her ... here."

"W-what?" another student said.

"Her shriek's around here somewhere." Ron waved vaguely around the castle, and the First Years' eyes darted around nervously. "You'll stumble on it eventually."

*​

"I don’t know," Hermione said as she buttered a piece of toast the next morning. "I think I’d like to do something really worthwhile after Hogwarts."

"An Auror’s worthwhile!" said Harry.

"Yes, it is, but it’s not the only worthwhile thing. I mean, if I could take S.P.E.W. further …"

Ron forced himself not to make eye contact with Harry, lest they both burst into laughter, when he saw something that made his eyes widen. One of the Gryffindor First Years was reaching for a jar of marmalade on the table.

"No — don't!" Ron said, but it was too late. The boy had already opened the jar, and he toppled out of his chair as a horrible, ear-piercing shriek reverberated off the walls of the Great Hall. Students and teachers alike covered their ears, some shouting at the poor boy who'd opened the jar and others groaning over the fact that they couldn't have one moment of peace. Hermione hurriedly rushed to screw the top back on.

"It's long gone, Hermione, you know that," Harry said, wincing as the shriek reached a painful pitch. "Just let it find a new home. It seems to be around the Slytherin table, at least. Wait, no, it's coming back here. God, is it my imagination, or has it got louder since last year?"

And just as quickly as it had appeared, the screaming suddenly stopped. Ron winced as he massaged his aching, ringing ears. "The marmalade," he groaned. "It ended up in the marmalade jar during the Leaving Feast, I'd completely forgot."

"Well, where is it now?" Hermione was frantically turning her head this way and that, as she tried to figure out what the scream had chosen as its new home. Lots of students and teachers seemed to be trying to solve the same mystery, so they wouldn't become the next poor soul who would accidentally set it free.

"Is that the Banshee's scream?" the First Year gasped. Pale and a little sweaty, he heaved himself back into his seat.

"Yeah," Ron said. "Peeves detached it from its portrait ages ago, for a laugh. Apparently the professors were able to capture it in a book in the Restricted Section, but, erm, I heard that some idiot set it free during my First Year."

"Is that the time?" Harry said, checking his watch as Ron sniggered. "We'd better go, we'll be late for History of Magic."

They slung their rucksacks over their shoulders and headed for a class in which Neville Longbottom, in approximately ten minutes, would open his textbook to find the banshee's blood-curdling shriek.

*Beginning lines lifted from Harry Potter and Order of the Phoenix