Review: Alice Immersive Wonderland
Cités Immersives' debut exhibition in the UK proves to be a charming and imaginative trip down the rabbit hole.
Image: Cités Immersives
More than 160 years after its publication, Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland remains a hugely popular story that's firmly embedded in our culture. From its countless adaptations over the years for stage and screen, including Disney's 1951 animated film and Les Enfants Terribles' much-loved 2015 immersive show beneath Waterloo Station, to being referenced in everything from The Matrix to one of Jefferson Airplane's best-known songs, it's an enduring piece of literature that's found its way into every corner of pop culture.
Alice Immersive Wonderland - the latest immersive exhibition from Paris-based Cités Immersives - looks to explore the history and popularity of Carroll's magnum opus through a series of highly detailed, whimsical immersive spaces packed full of interactive elements, pre-recorded performances and educational displays that invite guests to follow Alice down the rabbit hole and step inside the world of the novel.
Running at Dock X in Canada Water until March 2027, the experience serves as the UK debut for Cités Immersives and joins a long line of immersive exhibitions to have arrived in London in recent years. While many of them combined immersive elements like projections and VR with traditional museum-like displays, Alice Immersive Wonderland takes a different approach and instead focuses on creating an all-encompassing environment that's highly visual, tactile and, above all else, engaging to visitors of all ages without a glass cabinet in sight (if you ignore one room, which is full of them..)
Photo: Cités Immersives
The experience is made up of ten spaces, each themed after a different scene from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Following a brief in-world introduction from the show's only performer, who delivers some general health and safety rules (don't run, don't break the set, etc.), guests find themselves falling down the rabbit hole as they progress through a series of elaborately themed pathways adorned with mountains of pillows and upside-down furniture. Cabinets can be opened to reveal spinning optical illusions, while hidden pathways concealed behind fabric lead to small alcoves packed with even more detail. It's a terrific example of the kind of immersive world-building that keeps drawing people back to the form.
Other spaces include the Den of the Caterpillar, which is bathed in blue light and full of bioluminescent foliage and mushrooms; the smoke-filled Forest of the Cheshire Cat; and the manicured grounds of the Queen of Hearts' Castle, complete with hedges and playing card guards. Each offers a distinct visual identity and makes excellent use of Dock X's vast warehouse space to deliver diverse environments that wildly differ from room to room.
Visitors are encouraged to spend at least ten minutes in each scene, which proves to be sage advice given the sheer attention to detail on display. Opening doors will reveal everything from dancing lobsters to floral displays behind glass; small crawlspaces connect different areas; and displays, including an artwork of Carroll’s text in dense columns with Alice and other Wonderland figures outlined in the blank space between the words, all encourage guests to slow down, take their time and explore every nook and cranny.
Anyone hoping to have face-to-face interactions with any of the characters that appear in Carroll's original book, as was on offer in Les Enfants Terribles' Alice’s Adventures Underground will be disappointed, as the experience is devoid of any live performers outside of the introductory space - something that's at odds with the exhibition's marketing, which promises live performance at key moments.
Photo: Cités Immersives
The centrepiece of each space is a projection-mapped video, spread across several screens, which depicts Alice's journey through Wonderland and encounters with its peculiar inhabitants. These sequences cover key moments from the original story, from Alice shrinking after drinking the potion to her conversation with the Caterpillar and meeting the Mad Hatter and March Hare at the tea party.
The pre-recorded performances provide a useful overview of the narrative, particularly for those less familiar with the source material, and feature some wonderfully detailed costuming by Anne-Sophie Cochevelou, all of which is on display later in the exhibition.
The headphones given to guests upon arrival respond to their position within each space, allowing those standing near the projection-mapped sequences or additional video installations exploring the book's creation to seamlessly tune in without distracting others.
Photo: Cités Immersives
Beyond the set design, there's a wealth of interactive elements to discover throughout. Guests can take advantage of several optical illusion photo opportunities, complete personality quizzes to assess whether they're mad enough to be part of Wonderland (spoiler: we're all mad here...), and try their hand at games including chess, croquet and ring toss, all of which have been given a fittingly quirky spin.
The experience's final space, the Hall of Dreams, is fairly standard immersive exhibition fare, with 360-degree projections playing all four walls and the floor. Lasting around 20 minutes, this visual presentation has some strong moments - particularly when it features the experience's pre-recorded cast of characters - but it's let down by an overreliance on what appears to be AI-generated content.
It's a disappointing conclusion to an experience that's clearly been made with considerable care and attention to detail and feels particularly out of place after the richly realised handmade environments that precede it.
Photo: Cités Immersives
Overall, Alice Immersive Wonderland is a charming exhibition that captures the spirit and eccentricity of Carroll’s classic with considerable imagination. Regardless of your familiarity with the source material, it makes for an engaging and enjoyable visit, even if the live performance promised in its marketing is largely missing and the finale doesn’t match the craft of the rooms that precede it.
★★★½
[Tickets gifted in exchange for an honest review]
Alice Immersive Wonderland runs at Dock X in Canada Water until 21st March 2027. Tickets start at £26.00 for Adults and from £19.00 for Children. For more information and to book tickets, visit aliceimmersivewonderland.com
