The “Pretty Little Liars” Guide to Warner Bros. Studio

My name is Lindsay Blake and I am a Pretty Little Liars addict.  I started watching the ABC Family series on Netflix while the Grim Cheaper was away on a weeklong business trip last year and it was not long before I was utterly and totally hooked.  I’m no longer ashamed to admit it, either.  PLL is a great show.  There is good news and bad news about its filming locations, though.  The bad news first.  Production hardly ever – and I mean like ever – leaves the studio.  In the five years the show has been on the air, the cast and crew has left the lot about eight times.  Not joking.  The good news is that the series is lensed at Warner Bros. Studio and many of its locales can be viewed via the Warner Bros. VIP Studio Tour, which I have taken so many times now I’ve lost count.  So for the other fans out there, I thought I would put together a Pretty Little Liars guide to the lot.

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Pretty Little Liars is set in the fictional town of Rosewood, Pennsylvania.  The pilot episode was shot in Vancouver, but once the series got picked up, production moved to L.A.  Though the show has made use of pretty much every square inch of the Warner Bros. backlot, I will only be covering the main locations that have appeared onscreen during the first two and a half seasons, as that is the point I am up to in the series.  An aerial view of Warner Bros. Studio with coordinating numbers denoting each PLL locale is pictured below.

And below is a studio map featuring those same coordinating numbers.

1. The Marin House – Used repeatedly throughout the series, the house where Hannah Marin (Ashley Benson) lives is a large Colonial-style estate located at the southern end of Warner Village.  It is denoted as building 187 on the Warner Bros. Studio map.  Only the exterior is used on the series.  As is the case with all of the Liar’s residences, the interior of Hannah’s house is a set located inside of a soundstage.  In real life, the inside of the structure serves as a production office.

2. The Fields  House – The residence where Emily Fields (Shay Mitchell) lives also pops up regularly on Pretty Little Liars.  It is the northernmost house located on Midwest Street.  The same home was also used as Ross (David Schwimmer) and Monica Geller’s (Courteney Cox) parents’ house on Friends.  It is a practical set, meaning both the interior and exterior can be utilized for filming.  While the inside was used on Friends (Season 2’s “The One with the Prom Video”), it does not appear on PLL.

3. The DiLaurentis House – This abode has had quite a few different residents throughout the series.  Formerly occupied by Alison DiLaurentis (Sasha Pieterse) and then Maya St. Germain (Bianca Lawson), it is currently where Jason DiLaurentis (major cutie Drew Van Acker) lives.  The structure is actually just a façade located on the shores of the Jungle and, as you can see in the photograph below, not even a full one at that.  Yes, it is missing a roof, which is actually apparent sometimes onscreen.

4. The Hastings House – The façade that serves as the stately home where Spencer Hastings (Troian Bellisario, daughter of NCIS creator Donald P. Bellisario) lives is actually the rear side of the residence located next door to Emily’s house on Midwest Street.  The same façade was used as Lorelai (Lauren Graham) and Rory Gilmore’s (Alexis Bledel) house on Gilmore Girls.

5. Spencer’s Barn – The barn that Spencer painstakingly redecorated and that her sister, Melissa (Torrey DeVitto), then promptly moved into is located directly across from the Hastings residence, in what is actually the front yard of the property.

6. The Hastings Gate – The large gated entrance to Spencer’s estate is not a permanent façade – it is a piece that is set up in the Jungle, across from the DiLaurentis house, when needed.   Because it is only put into place during an actual shoot, you will not catch a glimpse of it while on the Warner Bros. VIP Studio Tour.  A photograph of the Jungle in its normal state, without Spencer’s gate, is pictured below.

7. Toby and Jenna’s House – The house where step-siblings Toby Cavanaugh (Keegan Allen) and Jenna Marshall (Tammin Sursok) live is located on Midwest Street, two doors down from Emily’s house.

8. Rosewood High School – The Liar’s high school is located on Midwest Street, near where it intersects with French Street.  The structure appears regularly on the series, but, again, only the exterior is utilized.  The hallways and classrooms are sets located inside of a soundstage.

9. Rosewood City Hall – City Hall is located adjacent to Rosewood High School.

10. Apple Rose Grille – The restaurant where the girls regularly hang out is located on the corner of Midwest Street and French Street.  The same spot masked as Luke’s Diner on Gilmore Girls.

The structure is a practical set and its interior is also used in the series.

11. Rosewood’s Local Church – The Midwest Street church, located across the road from Emily’s house, has appeared countless times on the series.  It was where Ian Thomas (Ryan Merriman) tried to kill Spencer in Season 1’s “For Whom the Bell Tolls,” where Ian’s funeral was held in Season 2’s “The Devil You Know,” and where Hannah tried to sabotage her dad’s wedding in Season 2’s “Over My Dead Body,” just to name a few of its appearances.

12. Anne Sullivan’s Office – Throughout Season 2, the Liars regularly visited therapist Anne Sullivan (Annabeth Gish) at her office, which was situated on Midwest Street across from the northern side of the church.

The same façade also masked as the Hastings & Reibman Law Firm, Veronica Hastings’ (Lesley Fera) law office, in the Season 3 episode titled “The Kahn Game.”

13. Ezra Fitz’s Apartment Building – The exterior of the apartment building where Ezra Fitz (Ian Harding) lives is located in between French Street and Embassy Courtyard, across from New York Park.  The edifice was featured in Season 1’s  “If at First You Don’t Succeed, Lie, Lie Again . . .” and is denoted as Building 60 on the studio map.

14. Philadelphia City Museum – The Warner Bros. Courthouse masked as the Philadelphia City Museum, the site of Aria Montgomery (Lucy Hale) and Ezra’s first real date, in “If at First You Don’t Succeed, Lie, Lie Again . . .”  The Courthouse, which was featured regularly on the 1966 Batman television series, is located at the western end of Embassy Courtyard and is denoted as Building 61 on the studio map.

As you can see below, Ezra’s apartment and the Courthouse are actually located next door to each other.

15. Noel Kahn’s Cabin/Lost Woods Resort – In the Season 1 episode of Pretty Little Liars titled “To Kill a Mocking Girl,” the Liars attend a party thrown at a cabin belonging to Noel Kahn’s (Brant Daugherty) parents.  The building used in the episode is located in the Jungle and is known as the Practical House.

The very same structure was also featured several times as the Lost Woods Resort on Pretty Little Liars.  (It popped up regularly as Merlotte’s Bar & Grill on HBO’s True Blood, as well.)

For whatever reason, a different structure was used as the Kahn family cabin during Season 3 of Pretty Little Liars.  I am unsure of what building was utilized as the cabin during that time, but my best guess is that it was the rear side of the Jungle’s Practical House, in the area denoted with a pink arrow below.

16. Emily and Maya’s Lakeside Hangout/The Greenhouse – In Season 3’s “Stolen Kisses,” Emily takes Nate St. Germain (Sterling Sulieman) to visit a lakeside cabin where she and Maya formerly hung out.  The Jungle’s Shore-Side Cabin, located opposite the DiLaurentis house, was used as their hangout in the episode.  The same structure also served as Ira’s Roadside Diner in Million Dollar Baby and Lyle Sussman’s (Scott Michael Morgan) hunting cabin on Dexter.

The rear of the Shore-Side Cabin is actually a greenhouse and it was there that the Liars often set up clandestine meetings during the beginning of Season 2.  My buddy Mike the Fanboy recently had the opportunity to tour the interior of the Cabin and was nice enough to share a photograph he took of it with me.

17. Radley Sanitarium – The large building located on Embassy Courtyard served as the mental institution where Mona Vanderwaal (Janel Parrish) was held for the majority of Season 3.

18. The Haunted House – In Season 2’s amazing Halloween-themed episode,which was titled “The First Secret,” Alison was attacked in Rosewood’s local abandoned house.  That residence is located on Midwest Street, directly across from Emily’s home, and was also used as the dwelling where the Seavers lived on the 1985 series Growing Pains.

19. Vail’s Doll Hospital – The creepy Brookhaven doll store that the Liars visited in both Season 2’s “Father Knows Best” and “If These Dolls Could Talk” (scariest episode ever!) is located in the middle of French Street.

20. The Brew – During Season 3, the girls start hanging out at a coffee house known as The Brew.  Emily also later gets a waitressing job there.  The façade that serves as the exterior of The Brew is located off of Midwest Street, just down the road from Rosewood City Hall.

21. The Local Rosewood Motel – A building that houses production offices located in the northeast portion of Warner Bros. Studio was used as a local motel in many Season 1 episodes, including “Can you Hear Me Now,” “The New Normal” and “A Person of Interest.”  It is denoted as Building 139 on the studio map.

22. Melissa’s Philadelphia Apartment – The apartment that the Liars raided in Season 3’s “Birds of a Feather” can be found on Brownstone Street, which is located just a little off of the map I created.

The façade’s location is denoted in the aerial view pictured below.

At this point you are most likely wondering why I have yet to mention Aria’s house.  The exterior of the Montgomery residence was actually only shown once, in the Pretty Little Liars pilot, and is therefore located somewhere in Vancouver, not at Warner Bros. Studio.  I am unsure of why a replica exterior was not used for subsequent episodes, but, for whatever reason, one never has been – at least during Seasons 1 through 3.

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Until next time, Happy Stalking! 

Stalk It: Warner Bros. Studio is located at 3400 West Riverside Drive in Burbank.  You can find out more information about the VIP Studio Tour here.