Where was 'His Dark Materials' Season 2 filmed? Here Are the Deets

Fans are thrilled because the latest season of His Dark Materials is finally airing. The wild fantasy show has captivated audiences thanks to its unique storyline. The imagery of the show helps, too, since it's so interesting itself and definitely helps with telling the story.

Now that there's a new season, people are wanting to know the Season 2 filming locations to visit IRL. If that's you, here are all of the details you need to book the ultimate His Dark Materials getaway.  

His Dark Materials is a fantasy show that airs on HBO (and BBC), and Season 2 is based on Philip Pullman's second novel, The Subtle Knife. It's the second book in the trilogy which also includes the novels Northern Lights (published as The Golden Compass in North America) and The Amber Spyglass.

For Season 2, fans will be able to follow along with Lyra in the parallel universe city of Cittàgazze. The set design of the show is (quite literally) out of this world, and it's not a surprise that people are curious as to where the show is filmed. Wanting to visit the mysterious place themselves, people are curious to know if the Cittàgazze is a real place on earth, (but with a different name, obviously). 

According to IMDb, the show's second season was shot in Cardiff, Wales. That's not to say that the entire set can be found on location because there isn't anywhere that completely fits the bill in terms of what the producers were looking for. 

The production team, according to several interviews, said it was a challenge to find exactly what they were looking for when scouting for locations to film.

“I looked at 120 different towns, went by Bonn, France, Italy, Morrocco, Croatia, Spain other kinds of European places,” production designer and executive producer Joel Collins told RadioTimes.com. “The research for Cittagázze — both environmental and for real towns — was exhausting.”

And it wasn't practical for them to take over an area and try and make it work. “What town’s going to let you take over the whole town to do a show, change lots of details, and own it for six months in summer?” Joel explained.

“I worked out very quickly while doing a lot of research that even if we found the perfect Cittàgazze – which would never be right because Cittàgazze has its own flavor – even if there was a place, it would be selling trinkets to tourists and toffees and Coke to tourists and stuff. And you won’t get in, other than one street for one week. So there was a practical consideration of being able to do that for real.” 

So instead of the location being a real one that people could visit, most of the scenes that took place in Cittagázze were filmed at Wolf Studios in Cardiff. The set was constructed out of wood and plaster by an incredible group of set designers, and it took approximately six months to get the whole set built. Some parts of the set were built with an indoor and outdoor option to work as a sort of fail-safe in case of bad weather. 

Season 2 of His Dark Materials is currently airing on HBO Max.