CASSOPOLIS — Magical wands, a talking sorting hat, floating candles and broomsticks are all part of the Cass District Library’s most recent attraction.

On Monday, the library’s Harry Potter Escape room opened. This two-week event is at the main district library and is free to the public. It booked up fast. At the time of press, only one slot was available.

“I heard about the escape rooms recently and how much they cost,” said Stephanie Knepple, who came up with the idea to have the escape room. “We wanted to allow the community to experience it.”

She said that she has seen escape rooms that cost as much as $30 per person.

The way the escape room works is a group of participants enter the designated room at the library and receive a set of instructions. There are then four puzzles they need to solve in order to “escape the room,” and they have 30 minutes to do so.

On Monday, six groups went into the escape room, and half solved all four puzzles.

“If they do not escape, they get ‘Potter Stinks’ buttons,” Knepple said. “Then if they do make it through they get a button that says, ‘Mischief Managed.’”

The room is open from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m., with one group scheduled to go through the room every hour. This gives Knepple time to set up the room after each group goes through it. So far, they have had groups from as far as Ohio, Illinois and Kentucky inquire about coming to the escape room.

“A lot of the [people from outside the area] have family that’s from around the here or they are on vacation,” Knepple said.

She decided on a Harry Potter theme for the room because the story originated as a series of books, and because she saw another person do it while she was searching the internet for ideas.

In order to make sure that the escape room was as fun as the ones that cost $30, Knepple and her co-worker Sue Pickar began preparing for the room in 2017.

“We started planning things in December and then Sue started really going at it at the beginning of the year,” Knepple said. “She even took things home to work on.”

Pickar created magic wands out of chopsticks and glue, an authentic-looking Mandrake out of a baby dollar and paper mache and broomsticks out of handles and sticks.

The local resale store, Helping Hands, gave them a lot of glassware that is used in the escape room for free. The pair also purchased Harry Potter items off of eBay.

“I had never bought anything off of eBay before,” Pickar said. “It was pretty cool. I got some great stuff from China.”

To welcome escape room participants, Knepple dresses up in a Hogwarts-themed outfit. She says that many of them hang around the library after they are done.

“We do have some activities out by the chair,” she said. A lot of people have just stayed afterward and done them.”

Given the success of the escape room, Knepple and Pickar hope to do another one in the future. This room is only planned for two weeks so that it does not conflict with the Cass County Fair.

For more information on the Harry Potter Escape Room or other programs that the Cass District Library offers, visit cass.lib.mi.us.