Dorms have been redecorated for haunted house
One floor of the Valley View Tower dorms is quickly being transformed into a haunted house for two nights of scaring.
On Oct. 30 and 31, anyone can enter the house for free. Guests will enter the lobby from 7 to 11 p.m and be led through a seven to 10-minute haunted floor in groups of eight.
“In most haunted houses, it takes you a good hour and a half,” said Alex Lisman, designer on the project. “And because we only have this floor, we have to make it super intense so people get super scared.”
Tower Terrorz is this year’s theme, which includes many different rooms: the burlap sac room, the Halloween room, the insane asylum, the scream room, “Resident Evil” room and a cave area.
“We guarantee that this will be the best haunted house in Logan,” said the other contributing designer, Dan Stuart.
Ninety percent of the display is made out of things Stuart had on hand, he said.
Lisman is a junior in fine arts, specifying in sculpture, which helps when he’s designing a haunted house with life-size dummies and other various props, he said.
All of the props are rigged with wires and string from the ceiling, and most of the props are motion-sensored or automated in one way or another, Stuart said. Stuart is a graduate student in electrical engineering and said he has rigged up many animatronics for the house, including a dummy that shakes by pushing the pedal of an old sewing machine.
Stuart and Lisman volunteer about three or more days a week for more than four hours to create the scary floor. Although they are not paid for their work, Lisman is a resident assistant for the sixth floor and said they are required as RAs to come up with activities for the students, this being one of them. He said he is also passionate about the project from past experiences with the haunted tower. When Lisman was a freshman, he said the RAs had set up different displays in every room on the floor. He said it wasn’t very scary though, because everyone would go into a room and then come out, as if to say, “Now what?”
“I thought to myself, ‘This is ridiculous, we have to do something better,'” Lisman said.
Stuart said they have gotten creative with the budget.
“On our budget, you’re always going to know it’s a dorm floor, but we’re trying to make sure that (changes), because what’s scary about a dorm floor?” Stuart said.
He and Lisman designed last year’s house, and without advertising, they had more than 300 people come. Because of the success of last year, Stuart said USU Housing is letting them extend it another day.
“We just went for it, and now it’s now become a tradition, and I can’t see myself not doing it,” Stuart said.
Lisman agrees.
“Our goal this year is disorientation,” Lisman said. “Last year people kind of had a general idea of where they were, but this year you’re so disoriented that even we get disoriented.”
When they lead groups through the course, Lisman said they will be moving some of the walls and having actors play multiple parts to increase the idea of disorientation.
Stuart and Lisman said they plan on having about 20 to 30 actors help with the two days. Lisman said they already have contacted some people for acting but they could use more.
To act, individuals can sign up by e-mailing Stuart and Lisman on their Web site at http://towerterrorz.tripod.com
Lisman said they hope to have the actors among the crowds as they are waiting to enter the course, and they will also have a video feed of people screaming as they go through the course to scare those waiting in the lobby.
-ranae.bang@aggiemail.usu.edu