The Remarkable Hours of ‘The Locksmith’s Dream’ (The NoPro Review)

A weekend of mystery awaits on the ancient borders between Wales and England

The Remarkable Hours of ‘The Locksmith’s Dream’ (The NoPro Review)
Image courtesy of The Locksmith’s Dream/Tricuspid

After seven candle lit dinner courses, each with a story behind it, you and your fellow guests are sent to your rooms, to await the sound of a bell. You find your room has been transformed, in ways both large and small since you last saw it. Before the bell rings, and ring it will, there will be things for all five of your senses to investigate.

You hear the bell. You leave your room. You, like it, have undergone a noticeable transformation, which is visible to all who see you. You can only imagine that your fellow guests have as well–and you will quickly be proven right. There is much to do tonight, and for a moment, it feels like anything is possible.

I was not entirely sure what to expect from The Locksmith’s Dream, an overnight experience at the remote, and stunningly beautiful, Treowen House in the Welsh countryside. The work is a collaboration between director Ivan Carić and writer Alexis Kennedy, the later the mind behind the popular video games Fallen London, Sunless Sea, and Cultist Simulator. The Locksmith’s Dream takes significant inspiration from Cultist Simulator, although those with no knowledge of the game (myself included) will feel more than welcome. The event proudly bills itself as difficult to define–and should I attempt to say too much, I would veer dangerously into spoiler territory.

However, bold attempts are rewarded at Treowen, and hopefully, dear reader, they will be rewarded here.

Image courtesy of The Locksmith’s Dream/Tricuspid

The Locksmith’s Dream is, above all else, the most thoroughly immersive event I’ve ever attended–and I’m not inexperienced in immersive events. A weekend’s worth of narrative moments, where you remain in character for a full 24 hours, including an overnight stay, solving innumerable puzzles, interacting with both the cast and your fellow guests, eating, drinking, and being very merry–even with the constant threats of murder and/or occult possession.

My partner and I were assigned the personas, which were attached to our rooms, of Lord and Lady Crimson. It was revealed that they are protective identities assigned to different people over the years, who have visited Treowen to hunt for secrets in the wake of the annual gathering of mysterious beings known as “The Hours.” Over the course of the event, the previous Crimsons played an increasingly important role in our explorations.

All guests are introduced via letters to their “sponsors,” organizations who have sent them (and their personas’ previous holders) to Treowen, including a religious organization, a tabloid newspaper, an auction house, and more. Your sponsor will give you a list of tasks to attempt and mysteries to solve, which can lead you down secret passages, brewing ominous potions, and more. In a fun twist, even once you’ve solved a particularly juicy mystery, you’ll still have a choice about what to do with your new knowledge.

Image courtesy of The Locksmith’s Dream/Tricuspid

The cast is small and ferociously talented. They are generally addressed by titles, rather than names–The Curator and The Inspector being two key players, along with Chef, Hawthorne the Butler, and the bartender Hatch. Chef is both a character and an actual chef–the meals of The Locksmith’s Dream are delicious, seasonal, and in the case of the lavish dinner, plot points in and of themselves. The menu leans towards modern British, with an emphasis on local ingredients–rarebit made an appearance fairly early on in our stay, although the menu changes for every group.

The rooms are all unique, and notably, do not lock–one of the requirements of keeping the integrity of the house, which dates to the seventeenth century. Relatedly, the bathrooms, ensuite and otherwise, are “water closets” in the literal sense, with fairly minimal showers and noisy toilets. My bedroom, The Crimson Room, was particularly beautiful, furnished with an antique bed and couch, a thick Persian carpet, and scarlet-patterned wallpaper.

While many of the choices at The Locksmith’s Dream are purely about narrative, a few are framed as value judgements. The tension between The Inspector, who is there on behalf of the Suppression Bureau, a vaguely governmental organization dedicated to keeping strange entities at bay, and The Curator, whose memory loss has led them to compulsively label everything (including, perhaps, you) is decidedly more complex than it seems at first blush. Hawthorne the Butler also has his secrets, and as for Hatch…well, his is a story with horror elements, albeit often very funny ones.

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There is some concern that the narrative wants you to “take sides” in the tensions in the house, despite an overarching insistence that there are no right or wrong choices in this experience. For instance, The Inspector is framed as a character to be avoided by nearly all elements of the narrative–despite the fact that, when you stop and think for a moment, evidence of their crimes, or even an ill will, is slim on the ground. This may be the inevitable fate of a bureaucratic character in a fantasy/horror story, however, I’ve heard rumors that the Inspector will soon lead painting classes to show off their softer side.

However, you needn’t concern yourself with the narrative at all, if you don’t want to. Guests can (and do) choose to spend the majority of their time solving puzzle boxes (they seem to pop-up like mushrooms in unlikely places), or treating the experience as a scavenger hunt while largely neglecting the story. On the other hand, if you aren’t a fan of jigsaws and lockbox puzzles, feel free to ignore them as you follow the story and interact with the characters all you like.

Image courtesy of The Locksmith’s Dream/Tricuspid

Guests are free to explore, within certain bounds, as they see fit. While you are set with goals to pursue, whether or not you choose to head to the upstairs gallery to pepper The Curator with questions is entirely up to you as well. While there is a risk of FOMO given that the event has more material than any one person could possibly take in on a single visit, the cast does an exceptional job of steering guests towards paths they’ll find rewarding rather than frustrating, and you can always ask your fellow guests for a catch-up on anything you’ve missed.

By the way, if you head to the bar, do tell Hatch that the Crimsons say hello, and don’t let him near you with a tape measure.

The attention to detail over the course of the weekend was legitimately extraordinary. Everything from the just-slightly-mismatched china on the tables to the paintings on the walls (was that last one here an hour ago?) is positioned deliberately. You’ll catch the cast changing up scenes near-constantly, and they always, without fail, have an in-character explanation of what they’re doing as they’re, say, hiding that lantern in the linen cupboard.

Just as impressive are the paper arts involved–every guest receives a unique leather-bound notebook filled with mysterious snatches of lore, as well as space to write down clues and collect stamps. And the pamphlets issued by the Suppression Bureau on the dangers of otherworldly possession look so much like actual UK Government pamphlets I did a double-take.

That being said, The Locksmith’s Dream is not for everyone for a number of reasons. The sheer physical exertions required mean that it is definitely not handicap accessible–guests can expect a tremendous amount of stair-climbing at a minimum, and possibly crawling down ladders, digging through dirt, and running through orchards. The recommendation to wear “sensible footwear” was, if anything, an understatement.

Further, an event like this most definitely does not come cheap, with tickets running well into four figures per couple depending on your room–and that’s before the optional purchase of cocktails. This is understandable–I kept thinking of all the work that went into making this possible, including engaging a bookbinder, an enamelwork artist, and a cast of on-site actors. The team behind this must have at some point put out a casting call for a talented chef/caterer who was also skilled at improvisational theater, and was willing to temporarily relocate to rural Wales. The remarkable part is that they successfully found and hired such a person.

Image courtesy of The Locksmith’s Dream/Tricuspid

If you’re a fan of puzzles and escape rooms, regardless of your familiarity with Kennedy’s other work, this event will likely knock your socks off. And for die-hard Kennedy aficionados (I met several when I was there), this experience will likely be the fan event of your dreams. If you’re looking for a calm, relaxing weekend in the countryside, The Locksmith’s Dream is most definitely not it, as you’ll leave physically and possibly mentally exhausted. But I could see this as an absolute smash hit for a bachelor or bachelorette weekend for escape room nerds.

That said, if you’re hoping to do any sort of comparison shopping, to see if you’re getting a better or worse value for money than at something similar, don’t bother. What could you possibly compare it with? What escape room has you staying overnight in a remote manor house? What country hotel getaway comes with its own haunted storyline? What mystery dinner party is dozens of mysteries wrapped into one setting? However you look at The Locksmith’s Dream, there really is nothing else like this.

The Locksmith’s DreamTreowen, Wonastow, Monmouth. Tickets from £500 per person. Accepting bookings through April 2023.


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