What is The Kraken House?

The Kraken House is our lovely home in the Lakeview neighborhood of New Orleans, that has been attacked by a giant Kraken! The Kraken has a pair of 12’ Skeleton Guards out front, and basked in an ever changing light display.

How did you come up with the idea for the Kraken House?

We wish we could say this was a multi phased elaborate plan, however, it was not. We had acquired one of the 12’ Skeletons (and the really cool dragon on the side of the house that gets no love whatsoever) over the summer of 2020. At a Halloween party, after having a few libations, David decided to look up “ridiculous inflatables” to surprise Michelle, who is super into Halloween. Michelle, after seeing the tentacles, decided they didn’t match her Skeleton, and refused to put them up. David thought it a bit of an extremely odd hill to die on, however, went along with it. Michelle announced she was putting them up for Mardi Gras since they were purple, green, and gold. David thought it was ridiculous. In part perhaps from the energy behind the Krewe of House Floats in the wake of the cancelled Carnival festivities of 2021, the Kraken was picked up by some amazing local bloggers, then local news, then a few national news sources. Kathleen Flynn with Reuters photographed the house and dubbed it “The Kraken House.” From there, BBC picked it up, and it truly went out of control around the world.

Moral of the story: Listen to your wife, she’s probably right.

How did you make the tentacles? What are they made from? Where did you get them?

We’re honored that people think we made them ourselves. I wish we had that level of talent. The tentacles are inflatables from Amazon. We’ll warn you ahead of time, they’ve quadrupled in price since we bought them in 2020. Apparently, they’ve now introduced more models in new and exciting colors! (As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.)

How big are the tentacles?

They vary between 11’ and 16’ feet long. They weigh about 13 lbs each. We weight them down with four 8 lbs free weights since they can’t be staked down on the balcony.

How did you get the tentacles to light up?

The lights inside of each of the tentacles are using Philips Hue Outdoor Lightstrips, the16’ lengths. The tentacles have a zipper pouch at the bottom to service the blower. We opened it up there, turned the tentacle inside out, then used large binder clips and duct tape to attach to the inside seam of the tentacles. This worked perfectly except for the one closest to the street, which was a little top heavy afterwards. The correct answer would have been to sew them, but that takes time, and our kids objected.

How big are the skeletons? Where did you get them?

The skeletons are the infamous 12’ skeletons from Home Depot. They are hard to find in stock. There are some great groups on Facebook to help you track one down.

What do you use for your lighting?
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Short Answer: For the most part, the lighting is Philips Hue lighting. The light up tree and the synced lights going up the staircase are Twinkly.

Let’s start with the Philips Hue set up:

1. I strongly recommend using the lights with the Philips Hue Bridge, and not Bluetooth. I find it too hard to control multiple lights across the house with the Bluetooth bulbs.

2. The Philips Hue Bridge can only support up to 50 devices. That includes light switches and other accessories. Believe me, this can be a problem if you have a lot of lights.

Ok, now the fun part:

• The lights in front of each window, as well as the lights in the soffit lights along the roofline are the Philips Hue A19 800 lumen 60w bulbs. Now, they have a newer version of this bulb that’s 1100 lumens 75w. The newer one is significantly brighter for white, however, it’s pretty close for colors.

• For the windows & soffits, I am using indoor bulbs. All the areas I use them are covered, and I haven’t had had an issue. My oldest bulbs have been outside since 2013 and I have never had to replace one of them.

• For the ground spotlights in front of the house, I use 8 Philips Hue Lily XLs (you’ll need this too). There are 3 on each side of the staircase pointed at the brick (When the skeletons are up, I shift one on each side to point at side of the skeletons), and then one on each side of the walk way pointed at the house.

• There is a Philips Hue Lily strapped into each skeleton at the base of their spine to make them glow, and I have 6 of the Lilys along the side fence on the trees.

• The lights inside of each of the tentacles are using Philips Hue Outdoor Lightstrips, the16’ lengths. The tentacles have a zipper pouch at the bottom to service the blower. We opened it up there, turned the tentacle inside out, then used large binder clips and duct tape to attach to the inside seam of the tentacles. This worked perfectly except for the one closest to the street, which was a little top heavy afterwards. The correct answer would have been to sew them, but that takes time, and our kids objected.

• Along the top of each staircase rail, the lip of the sugar kettle, as well as behind the Demogorgon, we are using Philips Hue Outdoor Lightstrips. They come in 7’ and 16’ lengths. Side note about this - I prefer these to the older indoor lightstrips even for indoor use. They have a lot more even of a color. I have not tried the new Gradient strips.

The Twinkly lights are amazing. Using your phone’s camera, you are able to sync the colors across your entire set up. I think we’ve only scratched the surface of what we can do with them. We used 6 sets total of these strands.

The lights in the steps are crap. I’ve replaced at least half of them so far. Don’t buy these. In fact, in some pictures, you can see where I straight have given up on replace the lights on the bottom two steps! I’m open to suggestion if someone has a different kind I should try.

Can we tour the inside of your house?

No. We have two kids. It’s scary for an entirely different reason not related to Halloween.

Can I AirBnB your house?

Nope, it’s a private residence.