'Netflix House' marks streaming giant's first theme park

After years of temporary pop-up events, streaming giant Netflix will make its first foray into the theme park space this week, rivalling entertainment giants Disney and Universal Studios.

The company's "Netflix House" theme park will open its doors Wednesday at the King of Prussia mall - one of the largest shopping centers in the United States, in the suburbs of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania - in a space measuring over 100,000 square feet (10,000 square meters).

The theme park, which will offer free admission, plans to host a wide range of dining and activities, all decorated to resemble some of the platform's most popular shows and movies, including "Bridgerton," "Stranger Things," "Squid Game" and "KPop Demon Hunters."

Netflix Chief Marketing Officer Marian Lee said the company opted against charging for admission because "we wanted that accessibility. We want to be an everyday destination."

"As we were launching these pop-up experiences, it became clear that we would actually have more flexibility if we had a permanent location," she told AFP in an interview.

Additional "Netflix House" locations are set to open after the Pennsylvania attraction, with one in Dallas, Texas scheduled to debut on December 11 and a third on the Las Vegas Strip in Nevada by 2027.

"Las Vegas is a very different space. It's not inside of a shopping center, but it is on the Strip...and so there, we will program it a little bit differently," Lee said.

Although Lee did not confirm the costs to build these theme parks, she said "you can see it's a huge capital investment for the company to invest in both the space and like all the finishings and the fabrications of everything."

As of right now, Lee said there no plans to build a "Netflix House" internationally. "We'd have to think about it in a different way," she said.