Where Is the Coop in 'The Watchers'?

A scene from the Warner Bros. movie 'The Watchers,' starring Dakota Fanning

Spoilers ahead

An obsession with fae runs deep in Europe—Cottingley fairies, anyone?—but A.M. Shine takes that to terrifying new heights with his novel "The Watchers." Ishana Night Shyamalan then took that rich lore and sprinkled her brand of fairy dust on it with her 2024 film adaptation (released as "The Watched" in the UK and Ireland).

It's a given that the fairy-infested forest in the novel is somewhere around the western coast of Ireland. "The Irish landscape is a horror lover's dream," Shine said in an interview. "Every setting in my two novels is a sight that I’ve experienced myself, and I’m thrilled if the reader can feel it like I did in the moment."

Shine was raised around Tír Mallacht, a tiny village in western Ireland that would become the basis for his second novel "The Creepers." Growing up, he and his brother would pass by a big, oddly shaped rock rumored to be a witch once. Years later, when he was penning "The Watchers," he would walk "many a wet woodland."

With great reverence for Shine's work, Shyamalan chose to film "The Watchers" in Ireland—she had never been to the island before scouting the movie locations. The city scenes were filmed in Galway, the author's hometown, as well as Dublin, but the mossy woods of Wicklow, on the eastern end of the island, was chosen as the home of the fay onscreen. 

Ardmore Studios, where the other forest scenes were shot, is in Wicklow; The Coop was actually a soundstage within the studios. Subverting old tropes of wooden cabins in the woods, The Coop was designed with concrete and glass.

Shine himself was on set during filming. "He’s been such an integral part of making the movie," Shyamalan recalled. "We hung out. It’s just been such an ideal relationship between us two."

Your imagination might run wild in the forests of Wicklow, Ireland. Photo via Luciann Photography