Lonely Dog Immersive Experience Orlando, FL

We took our schools to a field trip here. It was a really cool experience. The kids really enjoyed watching the art come to life. Staff was very supportive and helpful through out the time we were there. We even got to meet the owner. I recommend this place 100% and take your time while you are there.

We like dogs, we like art and we like surrealism. We came across this place and decided to drop by. First impressions were that staff were genuinely friendly and accommodating and not "theme park forced smiles" by any means. Nice people. You enter via a shop which is somewhat in reverse to most places but it gave a chance to look at things we might be interested in buying later and some really interesting artwork and artefacts. Clearly Ivan Clarke is an accomplished artist and you can see that by his previous landscapes and the backgrounds to his humorous dog paintings. Painting dogs is not that easy so don't let the novelty element sway you from the fact that these are accomplished works. The dogs are great, I was not so impressed with the cats which looked more like a cartoon and I didn't care for them. The "immersion experience" is a large auditorium and the "lonely dog" presentation is an animation that explains that Lonely Dog was an orphaned "houndling" whose mother is killed by evil cats and ends up in an orphanage which ends up broke so he has to hit the road. The animation quality is good. At one stage I noticed that the image behind the lens of an old dogs spectacles changed in size as he moved his head, not that is attention to detail! You don't have to dig deep to see the influences , Blues Brothers , Kerouac and Steam Punk with blues thrown in. The only thing missing was that Lonely Dog didn't have was a a human to lose, he had everything else though, lost family, lost home, bad choice of women etc etc Tip, Sit at the far end facing back into the main area. We didn't and half way through someone introduced himself as the owner and said we should turn around for a better experience, we did and it was better. Clearly the owner cares about his visitors and that was a nice touch. Also when you sit down make sure you are not under an air conditioning vent , my wife was freezing with bare arms so we had to move. There are some really surrealistic images such as dogs in Scuba gear milking Whales as their cat oppressors regarded Whale milk as caviar. Lonely Dog, after a short life on the road with his biker mate, unifies the dogs and cats by music and I guess they all lived happily ever after, I am not giving too much away as there are so many images. We have four dogs and wouldn't humanise them by putting them into clothes but the concept is weird but entertaining. Afterwards there is an opportunity to have a short VR experience for $5 and well worth it as it puts you on the steam punk airship submarine and you can swivel 360 degrees to follow the dogs and look outside the vehicle. You can colour some blank sheets if so inclined but we gave up colouring sixty years ago. There are some selfie booths with full sized models of the Lonely Dog and his cat girlfriend and a room full of original artwork. The staff were on hand to take photos if you wanted and to explain about the artist. There is a large "air ball pool" which looked interesting but we passed on this. I wish I could remember the names of the staff who helped us but sadly I can't but they were great and as my wife has some mobility problems showed care and patience. If you are looking for a theme park ride experience where all the thinking is done for you this is probably not the best place for you. If you want a kind of Salvador Dali , artistic blues style music with some steam punk thrown in together with some laid back escapism then this is for you. This is the kind of place you probably learn more the second visit than the first. Lastly, I collect fridge magnets and have hundreds and I bought two here for under $5 which is amazing value and the teller threw in a couple of Lonely Dog stickers and insisted on giving me the change back even though it was minor. Lonely Dog is a great brand and image and next time I will pick up a T shirt.

This place was definitely different! It was a Saturday & only 3 people in there. You wait in the gift shop until the next show that starts every 30 minutes. Then you go into a room with 360 screens & watch a movie about Lonely Dog. There is a bizarre scene, not so kid friendly, where the dogs “milk whales”. It left us shaking our heads so we cut the movie short by going to the next room. The room was full of pictures, then the following room was for coloring. After we colored a picture we walked through the small selfie area to let our son play in the ball pit. The only cool thing to do. There was no live music like the website stated (several empty dark rooms) & no one serving snacks or drinks at the empty stand. VR is an extra $5 each but no one around to help you if you wanted to do it anyway.

What a great story brought to life by the amazing work of artist Ivan Clarke. This was fun for the whole family and the underwater ball pit scene was a big hit!

I thought it was very entertaining. Nicole, the experience host, was very passionate and friendly. Would recommend! Absolutely