GULLIVER’S GATE

I guess I’m still a child.  I love miniature models.  Architect’s models of buildings and model train setups both seize me.  This weekend we went to New York with friends to see Gulliver’s Gate.  It is a total marvel of the small.  Displays include scenes from the entire world, with cars that move along roads, trains that wind in and out of tunnels and over bridges, and everything to 1:87 scale. That means that a six-foot man is .8 inches tall. The world here is populated by convincing people who are very tiny.

The entry invites visitors to, “Leave the Land of Large.”  That’s right, but to me the charm and attraction is how huge each display is and how far the  the miniature worlds stretch, so crammed with fun stuff that you could spend days and still find things you’d missed. In fact, Gulliver’s Gate is in a former factory and covers an entire city block near Times Square.  This is a big place of tiny things.

When you enter you receive a key on a lanyard which you can use to unlock blue boxes placed along the route in order to animate the scene in front of you.  You can make Tower Bridge open and close, and watch a rock concert on the screen with the tiny people dancing in front of the stage.  You can turn on the northern lights, but don’t forget to look way, way up, or you will miss Santa and his sleigh and eight really tiny reindeer flying silently above you.

Each scene was designed and crafted in the place it represents. The tiny Europe, for example was designed and made in Rimini, Italy by 31 model makers over 137 days. Russia was built in Grand Market, St. Petersburg by 67 modelmakers over 200 days.

Tourist attractions of the countries and continents covered, are here, but also the latest scientific wonders like Large Hadron Collider. The model builders used classic techniques, but also 3-D modeling.  You can even have a 3-D model of yourself to 1:87 scale created and placed somewhere in the exhibit (for $44.00.)  The very ancient meets the very modern here.

The space is filled with the unexpected.  I suddenly noticed Spiderman clinging to the top of the Brooklyn Bridge, Don Quixote hanging from the blades of the windmill he was tilting at, on a frozen Russian river Troikas share the ice with Sno-Cats, or the Russian equivalent.  If you clap your hands, you make the clouds over Lapland light up with lightning. There is a traffic accident on the highway in New York with flashing police and ambulances and boards from a truck spread over the pavement.

The displays cover continents, but think of a collage, not a painting.  Don Quixote fought his windmill in Spain, and the Hadron Collider is in Switzerland near Geneva, but here they are only a few feet apart.

When you visit Gulliver’s Gate with friends, each sees different things.  The most common remark I overheard was, “Oh, look at this!”  I kept thinking what part each of my grandchildren would love, planning future visits in my head.  Which leads to a last point, Gulliver’s Gate is not finished.  There is an airport under construction where you can peer inside the terminal and see the thousands of travelers from all over the world.  Its imaginary location is Alaska, and soon actual scale model airplanes will land and take off.  I can hardly wait!  Future sections on the Arctic and Antarctic are being planned, as well as expansion of the Africa section.

If you want to share just a tiny bit of my enjoyment, visit the website, https://gulliversgate.com And no, Gulliver’s Gate did not pay me a cent to rave this way.  It’s just that their creation and my inner child and adult imagination are a perfect match, and how often does something exceed your expectations?  With so much to mourn for in the real world, what a delight to spend a few hours in a magical place, created just for joy.