With her new series adaptation of Little House on the Prairie, showrunner Rebecca Sonnenshine set out to capture the distinct feeling readers experienced when they first read Laura Ingalls Wilder’s books. “When I tell people I’m working on an adaptation of Little House on the Prairie, everyone has very specific memories from reading it,” says the show’s creator. “The details from the books really stay with people, even 20, 30, 40 years later.”

Sonnenshine first devoured Wilder’s autobiographical series when she was 5 years old, and estimates she’s “read them a hundred times” since. Her adaptation draws from the third book in the series, and charts the Ingalls family’s passage from wooded Wisconsin to the endless prairie of Kansas — all from the perspective of the perennially spunky narrator, Laura (Alice Halsey).

As Charles, who Laura calls Pa (Luke Bracey), Caroline, or Ma (Crosby Fitzgerald), Laura, and Mary (Skywalker Hughes) endure roiling rivers and inclement weather on their journey west, the land emerges as its own formidable character — awe-inspiring, unknowable, and at times turbulent. To bring such a sprawling narrative and visual story to life, Sonnenshine assembled a group of people who similarly love the books — including production designer Jonah Markowitz and set decorator James V. Kent. 

“When you think of the prairie, you picture vast landscapes of rolling hills and grass and sky, but it’s also so much about these small, very intimate details,” Sonnenshine says. “That is our goal: to capture the vastness of the prairie but also all the details that make the book so special for people, whether they’re kids or adults.”

While the books remained Sonnenshine’s North Star, Little House on the Prairie also expands beyond them, particularly in its portrayal of the Osage people who already called the prairie home. “In trying to capture what was in the book about the Osage people, which was very ‘on the outside looking in,’ we crafted a story that would give us insight into who they were and what they were going through as people,” Sonnenshine says. 

Keep reading to journey from page to prairie as the creative team reveals how iconic moments from the books became fully realized locations and sets, and where Sonnenshine’s Little House on the Prairie paves its own path. 

Where the Ingalls live

With only a wagon full of everything they own and a flier advertising free land in Kansas, Ma, Pa, Mary, Laura, and Jack leave their home in the Big Woods of Wisconsin in search of a new beginning on the prairie. 

When you think of The Little House on the Prairie, often the first thing that comes to mind is the Ingalls’ covered wagon. Packed to the brim with everything they own, the vehicle takes the family over treacherous rivers and scorching plains in all kinds of weather. But for Markowitz, the wagon wasn’t simply transportation; it was the family’s first home.

“Everything we did was built from scratch,” he says. “The covered wagon appears a lot. It’s an iconic location, but also very character-driven. We thought about how each piece told something about the family.” The white canvas stretched over wooden hoops has become an indelible symbol of adventure, hope, and home, long before the Ingalls ever build their famous little house.

Set decorator Kent and production designer Markowitz hewed to the original text in both method and feel when constructing the Ingalls’ log cabin. Their version of the home isn’t simply designed to look authentic — it’s built the way Charles would’ve done it.

“We actually built it that way — no nails, all wood pegs,” says Markowitz. The result is a 90,000-pound log structure assembled with traditional joinery instead of modern construction methods. Kent focused on making the home feel as welcoming as the Ingalls themselves. “My aim was to make it as homey and reflective of the Ingalls family as possible,” he says. 

Run your hands over the carved mantel. Smell Ma’s fried salt pork and cornmeal cakes from the iron spider. Listen for the sound of a tin cup in the wind. The Ingalls’ hearth leaps off the page with all the textures readers imagined while immersed in the books. 

Kent paid particular attention to historical accuracy, sourcing authentic American antiques wherever possible, from period cast-iron cookware to yellowware pottery and reproduction fabrics for the family’s hand-stitched quilts. The result is a home that feels lived-in, with every object telling part of the Ingalls family’s story.

Look closely inside the cabin and you’ll find familiar objects from the books: Ma’s precious china shepherdess that sits proudly on the mantel. Laura and Mary’s combs and ribbons that stage their sisterly rivalry. Hand-stitched quilts that allow for a modicum of privacy. 

Even the cabin’s layout reflects its inhabitants. “We created spaces for each character to have their own world,” says Markowitz, from Laura and Mary’s shared bed to their trunk filled with book-rooted objects, the hearth, and other small corners that reveal each family member’s personality. 

“Everyone in art and props knows we have hundreds of millions of readers who love these books,” says executive producer Joy Gorman Wettels. “One of my favorite moments: the rocking chair that Pa makes for Ma. They ran around looking for artisans and built a historically accurate chair that matched the Garth Williams illustration.”

“We recreated the well mechanism that Charles builds almost exactly from the illustration [in the book],” says Markowitz. In the series, Charles has help from a new character, Adam Scott (Maclean Fish), a wealthy young man from Boston who isn’t quite suited to the dangers of building a well on the prairie.

Welcome to Independence

Miles down the road from the Ingalls’ homestead sits Independence, a young frontier town that’s still waiting for its first post office when the family first arrives. To create it, the production built an expansive backlot of 29 full-standing buildings rising from an open prairie field.

Welcome to Independence: a dusty main street lined with a general store, sawmill, hotel, and newspaper office. In Wilder’s book, Laura only catches a glimpse of the town. Here, the community comes to life. 

The series introduces Dr. Tann (Jocko Sims), the town medic, and Emily Henderson (Barrett Doss), who runs Henderson General Store. In Wilder’s books, Laura delights in the “boughten things” she can only find in town. The series brings that wonder to life inside the store, where shelves overflow with peppermint sticks, pickles, calico, and other carefully researched period goods. 

“The store and Dr. Tann’s office are based on real [places], characters, and research,” says Kent. Dr. Tann is drawn from George A. Tann, the real-life pioneer, physician, and neighbor in Wilder’s books, who delivered baby Carrie. Tann was born into a free Black family in the late 1830s. While Emily is not included in the original books, her name nods to Tann’s second wife, Eliza Harris.

Independence may be small, but gathering spaces like the church, courtyard, and founder’s tent help give shape and heft to the community’s values and myriad traditions. 

“We strove to create an authentic, rich world — full of detail, reflecting the personality of each family and character,” says Kent.

On the land

The prairie — both its daunting mystery and expansive beauty — looms large in Little House on the Prairie, with the physical spaces becoming their own characters alongside the townspeople. 

One of the books’ most memorable images becomes something entirely new in the series. The series reinterprets Laura’s mysterious tunnel through the prairie grass as an ancient Osage road, revealing the robust Indigenous history that has existed beneath the settlers’ feet all along. 

“We wanted to honor that story,” says Markowitz. “For many viewers, this is an introduction to the Osage people, so we took it seriously.”

The prairie isn’t merely a backdrop in Season 1, it’s a force that shapes every moment of the story. The still creek, buzzing mosquitoes, and humid air described by Wilder become more than atmospheric details, foreshadowing the devastating fever that sweeps through the settlement. 

Filming across all four seasons allowed production to capture that ever-changing landscape. “We were there for four seasons, seeing the prairie change,” says Markowitz. “The changing environment is visible in the show — the skies, the grass, the wildflowers.”

The Osage experience

Little House on the Prairie weaves the Ingalls’ story with the Osage’s experience. For Sonnenshine, expanding that world was central to the adaptation. “One of the reasons to do this was to fully realize the Osage characters, who are a presence in the book,” says Sonnenshine. “I feel like that is the spirit of Little House.”

The production blended European iconography with Indigenous colors to represent White Sun (Alyssa Wapanatâhk) and William’s (Meegwun Fairbrother) mixed heritage. Blue Willow china sits alongside handmade pottery. A painted folk-art bench featuring Osage motifs rests beside buffalo skins and woven rugs.

Working alongside Osage scholar and consultant Robert Warrior, the team grounded the Mitchells in history, drawing inspiration from the 19 Osage families who remained in Kansas as settlers arrived. “The family represents the West at this time,” says Markowitz. “The father is half European, half Osage; the mother is Osage. Many cultures are reflected in their house.” Kent calls it his favorite set to create because every object helped tell the story of a family living between two worlds. 

Unlike the books, which largely observe the Osage from a distance, Sonnenshine’s series invites viewers inside their community.  Building the Osage lodge required extensive collaboration with many experts, including the series’ cultural consultant Julie O’Keefe. O’Keefe brought binders of research, historical photographs, and reference books into meetings with the creative team. 

“Those meetings became real collaborations,” she says, as everyone worked together to ensure the village reflected Osage history as authentically as possible. “To tell an authentic story, you engage the right people.” 

The production also paid close attention to the characters who would’ve inhabited these physical spaces, helping to tell the story as authentically as possible. The result is a world where the series can explore not just history, but everyday life. 

“We lean into the humanity of the Osage — who they are, seeing them as husbands and wives and mothers and cousins and sisters,” says Sonnenshine.

The departure

By the finale, the Ingalls have transformed the prairie into a home, but tension over the land forces them back onto the road. They leave behind not only their cabin and hard-earned belongings, but a community they’ve come to love. Where will they go? Watch Season 2 to find out.

Wilder’s chapter jumps off the page in this gripping scene. Flames lick across wide swaths of land, and the zoomed-out shot makes the townspeople look like specks. “The prairie is raw and beautiful, but challenging,” says Markowitz. “It’s a dynamic landscape, which worked well for the story.”

The Ingalls indulge in a farewell feast — bowls spilling over with potatoes, toppling piles of cornbread, vases stuffed with flowers lining the long tables — to salve the pain of leaving a place they’ve come to call home. 

The farewell is also a reminder of the production’s guiding principle: If Charles couldn’t have packed it, it didn’t belong in the house. The family is forced to leave behind the plow, furniture, and livestock — just as they do in Wilder’s books — and the wagon, once again, becomes home. 

Episode 8 closes with one of Wilder’s most lasting images: framed by an endless prairie sky, the Ingalls’ covered wagon sets off into the unknown, becoming smaller and smaller as it inches down the road. 

For Markowitz, that final image captures the mission that guided the production from day one. “We wanted to make a beautiful show people could get lost in, while also giving them a connection to the books — making them feel like they’re watching what they read.”