Owners of Plainfield's 'Stranger Things' house vow to remain open amid neighbor conflict

An elaborate Halloween house in suburban Plainfield made national news for its "Stranger Things" display. But a neighbor's complaints almost caused them to shut down.

Image by hotgor61/Depositphotos.com

Update 10/7/22: Good news for horror fans! After a meeting at City Hall to discuss safety issues, the homeowners were cleared to reopen, but with limited hours.

The display can be seen anytime, but the lighting and special effects will run from 5 to 10 PM on Fridays and Saturdays and from 4 to 9 PM on Sundays. On Halloween, the hours will be 5 to 9 PM.

For details on this house, (look for the one titled Infested Oaks,) and a list of other area haunted house displays, you can check out the 2022 Chicago Haunt Builders List.

(CHICAGO) You've probably heard about the Stranger Things house in suburban Plainfield. Less than an hour from downtown Chicago, the Halloween display went viral on Tik Tok and attracted national media attention.

The star attraction of the display is a recreation of a "Stranger Things" scene in which the character Max Mayfield (played by Sadie Sink) floats in midair.

The couple, Dave and Audrey Appel posted the video to their TikTok account, Horror Props. The video now has over 157 million views.

Why did the Halloween house shut down?

According to a Facebook post from Dave Appel on October 2, "after a successful 2 days we are shutting our HorrorProps home*haunt down."

Appel explained in his post due to complaints and allegedly threatening behavior from a neighbor, the couple decided the safest thing to do was to shut down the display, despite their disappointment. "We truly truly apologize and it totally breaks our hearts. After more than 1500 hours of hard work, 8 total hours of being open over 2 days. We are closing permanently."

What happened next?

The Appels received so much support from online fans and their community they have decided to give it another try. On a Facebook post to the couple's HorrorProps page, they stated, "Yesterday, we were planning our tear down. Today we woke up to a flood of overwhelming support telling us to wait."

"We are not going to let one crazy neighbor ruin the fun for the amazing families and Stranger Things fans who have visited."

What's next for Plainfield's "Stranger Things" house?

It's good news if you were hoping to see the floating Max in addition to the couple's other elaborate and spooky Halloween decorations. Things are looking up.

The Appels plan on holding a live TikTok video on Wednesday, October 5th, to provide a final update on their future plans for the attraction.

However, for now, the couple would prefer fans hold off from stopping by. "Please hold off on visiting if you can. We want the dust to settle."

For now, we'll have to wait for the announcement to find out when the house will be open for viewing again.

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