Hostage is a gripping Netflix series with real life locations including 10 Downing Street and the House of Commons taking centre stage – but were they really used during filming?

The political thriller stars Suranne Jones as British Prime Minister Abigail Dalton. She faces some seriously tough decisions while in office. And we’re not just talking about budgets and having to play friends with Donald Trump… Abigail has to make some real life or death decisions when someone with a grudge targets her and her family.

As well as the tense plot, the filming locations on Netflix series Hostage will also keep you guessing. We attempt to answer all your questions about where it’s set, and the places used.

Hostage on Netflix filming locations: Was it really filmed at 10 Downing Street?

Set designers Arwel Jones and Laura Mayall told us that Hostage on Netflix was NOT actually filmed in 10 Downing Street. Or anywhere near it in fact! Sorry Keir, you don’t get a cameo role!

In fact, they recreated 10 Downing St from scratch on an abandoned airfield.

Arwel explained: “We knew we couldn’t shoot at the real place. Although we did ask whether we could go and measure up at Downing Street. But we were denied for some reason. While ideally you would survey the real thing, Laura worked out the scale of it from using Google Maps.”

Laura, in turn, explained: “While we watched a lot of footage and looked at a lot of images online, the main resource for us in recreating it was Google Maps. That was able to give us the relative position of everything. Then we had to work out how much we needed to build… In the end, the set was about 55 metres in length. We replicated both sides of the street, and ended up building it to the height of the ceilings of the first floor.

“We got the scale correct by counting bricks and paving stones in images of the real 10 Downing Street. You literally count how many bricks there are between the windows and work it all out from there.”

‘Biggest challenges in building filming locations for the show’

Arwel Jones explained that the biggest challenge in building the filming locations on the show was the staircase to Number 10.

He said: “Originally, we weren’t going to have a staircase inside Number 10. You’d see the ground floor with a few stairs and then we’d shoot on the first floor and they would be separate entities. However, it became apparent due to the flow of the shoot and to keep the frenetic pace of following the Prime Minister as she’s walking around, that we needed one.

“The actual one in 10 Downing Street is this famous yellow townhouse staircase. But, where we were shooting in Langleybury House, it was more of a grand, sweeping country house staircase. So we had to come up with a way of making them look the same. However because it’s a listed building we couldn’t risk damaging anything.

In fact, the staircase was all supported through a puzzle of wedges and free-standing fixes, balancing against its own weight.

Langleybury House aka Langleybury Mansion is a vacant 18th century manor house with beautiful period interiors and exteriors just outside the M25 towards the north west of London. The exact location is in Abbots Langley, Hertfordshire.

Did cast and crew film in the real House of Commons?

Arwel and Laura explained that the House of Commons was recreated in a slightly different way.

Arwell revealed: “We were able to recce the actual House of Commons as we hoped to shoot there. Sadly when we were due to start, the Labour government had only just come to power. So a lot of the people who needed to give the okay hadn’t been appointed yet.

“When we realised it wasn’t going to happen within our timescales, it came down to two choices; you find a location to use that’s similar, or you build it. We bit the bullet and decided to build it and, once again, followed a similar path as we did at Downing Street.”

Laura added: “This time we were able to scale it up from just one measurement I found online. It’s the distance between the two party’s benches. The whole set was built from that.”

Arwel went on to say about the House of Commons build: “Viewers won’t necessarily know that all the plaques on the back wall are exactly like the plaques in the real House. Or see the beautiful artwork on the pillars and panelling which is all as accurate as possible.

“It looked incredible on camera, and to see everyone’s reaction to it when they first came on set was such a great feeling. It was such a joy to create. So although we couldn’t film in the real House of Commons, we won in other ways.”

What other filming locations were used on Netflix series Hostage?

Cast and crew also filmed in Las Palmas, the capital of Gran Canaria in Spain. The location was used for the rundown building where the hostages were held.

Arwel said: “That was really cool as we used a team out in Spain who we hadn’t worked with before, and they knocked it out the park.

“Here’s something to look out for – we produced a lot of the portraits you see in the background of shots and there are a couple of nice easter eggs in them. If you look very closely at one in the French ambassadors living areas it might look a little like someone not too far away from me now…”

Laura added: “Yes that’s right. And then, in the reception room of 10 Downing Street, one of the portraits of a founding Prime Minister looks a lot like someone very important on the show!”

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Hostage streams on Netflix streams from Thursday, August 21, 2025.