The Ultimate Hogwarts Dinner Event | How To Create a Herbology Class

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Welcome to the Herbology edition of the Ultimate Hogwarts Dinner Event series!

Recently I was part of a team who turned our church into Hogwarts for a youth event. We decked out the entire building in Harry Potter magic, and for 2 hours the kids were students at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. In this series I’m sharing how we set up each classroom, and the activities we held in them. Be sure to check out the rest of the series by clicking the links at the end of this post.

“Three times a week they went out to the greenhouses behind the castle to study Herbology, with a dumpy little witch called Professor Sprout, where they learned how to take care of strange plants and fungi, and found out what they were used for.” – Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone.

As leaders of this epic Harry Potter themed evening, we were all a Professor or adult character from the books, and yours truly here was Professor Pomona Sprout. This meant that I was in charge (along with my helper who had previously been in charge of The Three Broomsticks and so whose character was Madame Rosemerta) of the Herbology classroom and the activities within. I have to say it was a joy being Professor Sprout, and the idea that my character’s position at Hogwarts was later taken over by Neville Longbottom only added to that joy.

Herbology Decor

Before I got to the building on the day of set up, the team had already started putting up some fantastic decorations in the room that would soon be Herbology. Hessian fabric was hung on the walls, and draped over the book cases to hide the busy shelves, and on top they had pinned a whole heap of greenery. I had also come prepared with a multitude of plant-related items to spruce it up a little, and add a few more details.

Here’s what I included in the Herbology class:

Plant diagrams and posters on the walls (print outs from online and photocopies of the Harry Potter Illustrated editions)
Plastic pots
Picnic basket
Other cute baskets
A trunk
Extra vines and plastic plants I bought at the dollar store
A few real plants in pots
A crocheted mandrake that I had made and popped in a pot (I made up the pattern but this one here by Maffers is super cute)
A clay-made Mandrake which I had also made prior to the evening. I followed this great tutorial on Hannah Snow’s channel.
A basket of Dragon Eggs, which I also made, and I know that they’re not really Herbology-class material, but we didn’t have a Care of Magical Creatures class and I really wanted to display them.
Popsicle sticks with interesting plant names on them.

By the end of the set up, it was definitely looking much like greenhouse or a Herbology classroom might look. The downside is that the students were in there for only about 10 minutes, so they probably didn’t really appreciate all the decor. Oh well. I enjoyed it.

Herbology Activity: Mandrake Making

There’s not a lot you can do in 10 minutes, especially when you’re trying to herd a bunch of young teens, but I was super impressed with just how much they managed to get done in the short amount of time that they had with Sprout in Herbology. All of them managed to make a mandrake, which means they all passed the class and got a decent grade.

We were making mandrakes, and after the first wave of students came and went, my friend Madame Rosemerta and I decided to skip a step or two to make it faster. We made them with actual soil and seeds, with stockings and rubber bands.

Here’s what we did:

Taking a pair of stockings, cut the stocking across into about 3 pieces. Each kids gets a piece (so, they might get a piece with a foot, a piece with 2 open ends, or the crotch part), and they need to tie a knot in one end. If they have a foot end, then they’re fine without a knot.
Next you pop a pinch of grass seed in the bottom, and pile in about 2-3 scoops of soil on top.
Pop a knot in the other end so the soil doesn’t tumble out.
Then it goes upside down in a plastic cup (or plastic pots if you have them), so the grass seed is at the top.
Then taking rubber bands, you want to make lumpy bunches in whatever way you like. Just grab a section of stocking with soil in it and tie a band around it.
Once you have your bunches in an acceptable shape, push two screws into the stockings for eyes.
If you have the time, takes some super glue and place a drop onto the screw-head, and pop an All Spice on it (or a small black bead, or something similar). This is the step we skipped because it was taking too long.
The kids can also add string to their bunches, around the bases to create a root-like effect.
The final step is drawing a mouth on the mandrake.

If you’re an adult with all the things you need in one place, then it only takes about 15 minutes. But if you’re a young teenager in a room with other young teenagers, and you need instructions multiple times, then it’ll take longer. That’s why I was so impressed at how speedily some of the kids got through all the steps. With a little water in the bottom of the cup, the grass should grow.

We had about 6 lots of 12 students come through Herbology, so by the end of the evening we had around 70 mandrakes sitting on the classroom floor. Typically, only about 15 kids came back to retrieve theirs before they went home.

So that was the Herbology class! A little different, perhaps, to the one that Harry, Ron and Hermione attended back in their first years at Hogwarts, but a fun version of it all the same. For those of you interested, my Professor Sprout costume consisted of a green leafy gigantic poncho-like robe and matching hat. Because the gown was so big I wrapped a rope around my waist to help keep it up and to give it a little shape.

In the movies, Sprout is depicted with a brown dress, brown hat and her well known dragon-hide gloves. If you want to replicate it, I could stay away from the hire shop and make it yourself. Remember to add fuzzy earmuffs to the outfit, especially if you’re re-potting mandrakes.

Check out the rest of the series: