THE STORY OF DARKPARK
- Chapter 01 2013
A BOY WITH A DREAM
Gijs Geers was an actor. Among other things, he performed in the musical Soldaat van Oranje, but he had the feeling that theater could be more than sitting in a seat watching what other people are doing on a stage. He dreamed of a kind of theater in which you, the audience, play a part in the story yourself.
He bought a hammer, a saw and some drywall, and rented the top floor of a building in Delft. After months of building, Gijs opened one of the very first escape rooms in the Netherlands in 2013, back then still under the name Escape Challenge: The Dentist.
That escape room set the tone right away. The Dentist challenged players to step out of their comfort zone and push their limits. It also laid the foundation for the DarkPark philosophy there and then: putting visitors right inside a story, as if you're playing the lead in a movie, except it's real.
- Chapter 02 2015 - 2017
GROWTH AND BOUNDLESS IMAGINATION
After the success of The Dentist, the ambition grew. In 2015, the second escape room in Delft followed: Freakshow, an intense journey through a twisted circus world full of bizarre surprises and physical challenges. Players walked a tightrope between fear and wonder. Every new room in Freakshow had its own theme and look, and there wasn't a single combination lock to be found in this escape room. That was unique at a time when more and more escape rooms were opening their doors, with combination locks as the backbone of every one of them.
The urge to build new worlds led to a second location in Zoetermeer in 2016. Here, Gijs went a step further. After more than a year of building, the first experience at the new location opened in 2017: Honeymoon Hotel. This escape room let players descend into the mysterious splendor of a dilapidated hotel full of dark secrets. Inspired by the notorious serial killer H.H. Holmes, Honeymoon Hotel took you through lavish art deco rooms where something sinister lurked behind every elegant facade. Fans welcomed the room with open arms, and in 2018 it even picked up an international TERPECA award, the Oscar of escape room prizes.
Not long after came The Orphanage (2017), where an abandoned girls' orphanage became the stage for a nerve-racking adventure. In this experience, players were sent off with a lantern through creaking corridors and dusty dormitories, while the feeling crept over them that they were not alone. The Orphanage was praised for its blood-curdling atmosphere and ingenious puzzles, and gave many a player clammy hands. Once again, it was a huge success.
Every new room, from the dental practice in Delft to the grim hotel and orphanage in Zoetermeer, had its own story and its own origin, but they all shared the same mission: to take the player on an unforgettable emotional journey.
- Chapter 03 2019
THE END, A NEW BEGINNING
By now, a whole team had formed around Gijs, building on the dream with the same vision and the same passion. At the peak of this creative explosion, the team decided to take on the ultimate challenge: The End. In 2019, The End opened in Zoetermeer, an escape experience that lived up to its name and at the same time ushered in a new chapter for Escape Challenge. The End was more than an escape room; it was an intense, story-driven experience that pulled you in from start to finish. DarkPark's signature mix of atmosphere, storytelling and puzzles reached its peak here.
With The End, a transformation took place behind the scenes too. The name Escape Challenge no longer covered what the company had become. The term escape room turned out to be too limiting for ambitions that kept on growing. And so, in 2019, Escape Challenge became DarkPark. Under the new name, the team set a course that put DarkPark firmly on the map, at home and abroad. That same year, The End swept every major international award there was to win, confirming what fans had known all along: DarkPark belonged among the very best escape rooms in the world.
- Chapter 04 2020
INNOVATION IN A TIME OF CRISIS
No thrilling story is complete without challenges, and they came in 2020. When the coronavirus pandemic locked down the world, DarkPark had to close its doors for a while too. But sitting still didn't fit the team's vision. Instead, they decided to redirect their creativity to people's living rooms all over the world. At breakneck speed, Conspiracy-19 was conceived and developed: an at-home escape adventure that could be sent by mail. Thousands of fans seized the chance to support DarkPark in this difficult time and bought this first Home Adventure in droves, helping the company through the first lockdown. Conspiracy-19 became a worldwide success, and it left everyone wanting more. New home adventures soon followed, such as Witchery Spell, which grew into an international hit and landed in the top 3 of favorite at-home games for many an escape room enthusiast.
Still, the itch to push physical boundaries remained. During the lockdowns, an unprecedented opportunity came along, and DarkPark once again took a leap into the deep end. In an abandoned building in Vlaardingen, near Rotterdam, a project of unprecedented scale took shape. This is where one of the biggest and most ambitious escape experiences in the world was created: Stay in the Dark. A colossal five-story factory building (over 4000 m²) became the setting for a 3-hour journey that blurred the line between escape room, horror movie and interactive theater.
When Stay in the Dark was finally allowed to open its gates after the lockdown, tickets flew out the door. The first two months sold out completely within 48 hours. Players from the Netherlands and abroad rushed to Vlaardingen to experience this legendary adventure. In small groups, they wandered through pitch-black halls, creaking stairwells and mysteriously furnished rooms. Stay in the Dark played masterfully with tension: from spine-chilling moments to breathers full of cautious relief, only to strike again with the next terrifying surprise. DarkPark itself aptly described it as fun-scary: yes, dead scary and intense, but always with the goal of you having a great time and walking out a stronger person. This unique mix caught on. For more than three years, Stay in the Dark was fully booked without fail, and it grew into a living legend among escape room fans. Sadly, this magnum opus was temporary by definition: the old factory building was given a new purpose and was demolished in 2024, forcing Stay in the Dark to write its final chapter. But what a chapter it was: an experience that everyone who lived through it will remember for a long time to come.
- Chapter 05 2024
THE DARKVERSE FAMILY
Over the course of more than ten years, DarkPark has grown from a small adventure in Delft into a phenomenon with worldwide fame. Where other escape room companies mainly draw local visitors, DarkPark has built something unique: a fan base of its own. More than 50,000 enthusiasts worldwide count themselves part of the DarkVerse Family, a close-knit community of escape room fanatics with a special place in their hearts for DarkPark. They understand better than anyone that DarkPark stands for more than just escape rooms. It's a feeling, a world of its own, where you as a player are at the center and get to live a different life for a while.
That unprecedented support from the DarkVerse Family also proved crucial for DarkPark's future. In early 2024, a unique opportunity, and challenge, presented itself. The building in Delft where it all began came up for sale at a moment when property developers were eyeing the land. There was a real chance that a new owner would tear the building down to make way for housing. DarkPark was in danger of losing its original home, quite literally. But DarkPark wouldn't be DarkPark without dreaming big: why wait for fate when you can buy the building yourself?
With the help of its supporters, DarkPark launched an ambitious crowdfunding campaign. Hundreds of fans and investors joined forces to make the plan possible, and it worked: before the tenth anniversary, Gijs Geers and his fans together managed to buy the building in Delft, the place where the first visitors to The Dentist were once locked in. For the first time, DarkPark has a permanent home base of its own. A safe haven, anchored in history, from which the future can be written. A breeding ground for wild new ideas and thrilling stories. Here, future generations of creative minds can keep building on what DarkPark stands for, and always will.
- Chapter 06 Now
THE STORY GOES ON...
The history of DarkPark reads like an adventure novel, a story of vision, guts, imagination and community, but it started with a boy who bought a hammer, a saw and some drywall to make his idea a reality. That's what DarkPark stands for. We believe in people and their dreams. We want to inspire everyone to get the best out of themselves and to go for their dreams. Fear is all in your head; magic happens when you dare to look that fear in the eye.
What began in 2013 as one man's wild idea has grown into a movement that pushes the boundaries of entertainment. Time and again, DarkPark has shown that it is more than a collection of escape rooms: it's a gateway to other worlds. In every chapter, you as a player take center stage. Whether you're sitting in a dentist's chair, escaping from a creepy hotel, wandering through an orphanage or exploring a factory hall in total darkness, it's always about your experience, your adventure. Every time, you walk out a different person than the one who walked in. That transformation, forgetting everything around you for a while, conquering yourself and returning to the real world full of adrenaline and wonder, that is what DarkPark stands for. And with a permanent home base and a worldwide family behind it, one thing is certain: the story of DarkPark has only just begun. The next dream, the next boundary-pushing adventure, is already on the drawing board, ready to become reality in a way others don't even dare to dream of yet.
DarkPark keeps building enchanting worlds, so you can experience them time and time again. Stories in which you as a player take center stage; stories that bring about transformation, and we've been doing that since 2013, with many more thrilling chapters ahead.
WHAT'S YOUR NEXT ADVENTURE?
