The University of Oxford in Oxford, England is the oldest, still running university in the English-speaking world. While many sites across the United Kingdom were used to film various scenes for the film adaptations of the Harry Potter series, no one site was as prominent as the University of Oxford. Furthermore, even when not directly filmed, the school's many architectural splendors provided inspiration to the filmmakers. What could be better for the famous institution to add to its list of accolades than inclusion in the movies of Harry Potter?
Christ Church College is one of the many colleges that comprise the University of Oxford. Not only a school, Christ Church is the cathedral church for the Diocese of Oxford. For the first movie, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, the stone staircase that the students climb before entering the Great Hall is one of the many stone staircases inside Christ Church. The Great Hall in the movies is a direct reproduction of the great hall of Christ Church. The high, vaulted ceilings, long row tables and tall, wide windows were a perfect match for Hogwarts.
Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry is, as mentioned in the title, a school. Naturally, a school has libraries. A school as grand and old as Hogwarts would certainly have grand, old libraries. Both the Boleian Library and Duke Humphrey's Library, which is actually the oldest reading room inside the greater Bodleian Library, are used as Hogwarts filming locations. Some dining room scenes were shot in the Bodleian as well as the great hall of Christ Church to give the Great Hall of Hogwarts a more magical feeling. Duke Humphrey's Library was used as the restricted book section, which Harry sneaks into in the first movie.
The Oxford Divinity school of Theology, built in 1488, is physically attached to the Bodleian Library. The high-windowed Perpendicular Gothic school is, among others, the site of the Hogwarts infirmary. After Quidditch matches, big fights, or botched magic spells, the high windows of the Divinity School proved the perfect, sunlit site for the hospital wing.