Wonka's chocolate factory out of biscuit in Waterstones window to celebrate book's 50th anniversary

To celebrate the 50th anniversary of Roald Dahl’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, the hit West End musical and Biscuiteers, supported by Tate & Lyle, have recreated the chocolate factory in biscuit form in the main window of Waterstones flagship shop in Piccadilly.


The 6m x 1.7m edible chocolate biscuit installation, based on the Olivier-nominated Charlie and the Chocolate Factory musical stage set, was designed and created by Biscuiteers and unveiled by Willy Wonka and Charlie on 8th April.

The entire chocolate factory has been lovingly recreated so that passers-by can look through this extraordinary 3D structure into each room and see Augustus Gloop being sucked in to the chocolate river in the chocolate room, Violet Beauregarde blowing up into a blueberry in the inventing room, Veruca Salt being thrown down the rubbish chute in the nut room and Mike Teavee being shrunk in the television room.
It took Biscuiteers 300 hours to design, bake, build and decorate this edible Chocolate Factory made using over 100kg of biscuit dough and 200kg Tate & Lyle sugar. The display will remain in the branch for four weeks.

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory the Musical: Theatre Review

Written in 1964, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is one of Roald Dahl’s most loved books. Also made into two films (one in 1971 and one in 2005) its a franchise that people of all ages have loved and grown up with, and now its a West End Musical! 

The production is very good, its magical with elements that truly are astounding and take you back to your childhood. Quite often I found myself with my jaw almost to the ground at some of the aspects of the show. Sam Mendes’s direction flows so well with huge help from the swift and flawless scene changes. He has brought the sharpness that movies have to the stage, you do not get bored at any point in the show. The pace of it moves quite fast, too fast at some points. You almost feel like some things could have been cut out to enable some of the really good moments to be drawn out a little. The set, by Mark Thompson, was fantastic.