Penny Haywood

"Pleasant and popular, Penny Haywood knows all the latest gossip around Hogwarts. She can use her potion skills to get you out of tricky situations." — Penny's character description in the Game.

Penny Haywood
Biographical information
Born	Between September 1, 1972 and August 31, 1973 London, England (Great Britain)
Blood status	Half-blood
Physical information
Species	Human
Gender	Female
Hair colour	Blonde
Eye colour	Blue
Skin colour	Light
Family information
Family members	Father Mother Beatrice Haywood (Sister) Winifred Haywood (Step-grandmother) Haywood Family
Magical characteristics
Boggart	Werewolf
Wand	Unicorn core, length, and wood
Affiliation
House	Hufflepuff
Loyalty	Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry Haywood Family Hufflepuff Hippogriff Club Sphinx Club Wigtown Wanderers Circle of Khanna Main Character

Penny Haywood (born c. 1973) was an English half-blood witch who began attending Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry in 1984 where she was sorted into Hufflepuff. She was noted as being the most popular girl in her year.

Biography

Early Life

Penny was born in London to a Muggle father and a Muggle-born witch mother. She had a younger sister named Beatrice who was born four years after her. Growing up, Penny was shy and would keep to herself reading books and brewing potions. Her step-grandmother Winifred Haywood started her interest in potions. Her step-grandmother encouraged her to open up and challenged her to games and scavenger hunts. Penny first performed magic while brewing a potion under Winifred's supervision, adding the finishing touch to the brew.

During the summer, Penny would go on vacations with her family to the country. On one of these vacations, a Muggle friend of Penny's, Scarlet Sparks, accompanied them. Scarlet and Penny went wandering through the woods during a full moon when they discovered a werewolf. Rather than being frightened by the creature, Scarlet was intrigued and wanted to follow it. Penny, however, had been paralyzed by the sight of it. By the time she came to and wielded her wand, Scarlet was killed by the werewolf before Penny had time to react. Feeling responsible for the death of her friend, werewolves had become the object of Penny's greatest fear, troubling her to the extent she brewed a Forgetfulness Potion to rid herself of the memory.

Hogwarts Years (1984-1991)

First Year

Penny was known for her impressive academic performance in Portions Class and her talent in Potion-making. She befriends the Main Character and helps them create the Sleeping Draught they needed to break into the locked room where they were looking for the Cursed Vaults.

Physical Appearance

Penny had long, blonde hair which she wore in two thick braids over her shoulders and a braid on her left side that formed a ponytail, giving her a half-up style. She often styled her hair differently for special occasions. Penny also had bright blue eyes and light skin. She almost never wore anything other than her plain Hufflepuff robes. She wore different garments for special occasions. Those outfits always featured yellow. In her seventh year Penny began wearing a casual outfit with a white shirt, blue denim jacket, yellow skirt, and boots.

Personality

Penny was sociable, approachable, and regarded as the most popular girl in her year while attending Hogwarts. As a result of her social standing and vast network of friends, she was very well-informed about the happenings at Hogwarts. Penny was often excitable, eager to hang out and help her friends, and sometimes easily distracted.

Magical Abilities and Skills

• Potion-Making: Penny was a skilled Potion-Maker, and was considered one of the most proficient in her year. She often enjoyed brewing experimental mixtures in her free time. She successfully brewed the Sleeping Draught and the Strengthening Solution in her first year and the Forgetfulness Potion in her third year. With the help of the Main Character, Penny brewed the advanced Draught of Peace in her fifth year. Other potions she made or claimed to be able to make were the Wolfsbane Potion, Polyjuice Potion, and the Animagus Potion. Professor Snape openly acknowledged Penny to be his most gifted student in the subject and deemed her the only one eligible to receive a private lesson from him on the highly advanced field of Alchemy. She took the subject at N.E.W.T.-level.
• Charms: Penny was rather good with charm-work, as she was capable of successfully casting the Fire-Making Spell, Colour Change Charm, along with the Knockback Jinx, showing she was skilled with the casting of such charms.
• Social Networking: Due to her remarkably pleasant and affable nature, Penny was able to easily befriend most people at Hogwarts and swiftly establish a rapport with them, which quickly earned her a long-standing reputation for being the most popular girl in her year, to the point that she is known for knowing all the gossip traveling at Hogwarts. This was notable through her awareness of the reason behind Merula Snyde's antics, Ben Copper's cowardice, the Main Character's public scrutiny, and Albus Dumbledore's school departures. Despite being frequently well-informed and thus being renowned for knowing everybody at Hogwarts, Penny's network and social contacts were not always a perfect source of information, as she was unfamiliar with abrasive Quidditch player Erika Rath, and had never heard of famed Curse-Breaker Patricia Rakepick up until the latter's arrival at Hogwarts.
• Duelling: Penny was a proficient duellist and would sometimes duel the Main Character.
• Healing magic: Penny had some skill in the field of healing as she was able to successfully cast the Episkey healing spell.
• Dark Arts: Penny was shown to be possess a degree of skill in the Dark Arts, being able to successfully cast dark charms such as the Knockback Jinx, the Full Body-Bind Curse, and the Ear-Shrivelling Curse.
• Herbology: Penny was skilled in Herbology, as she was able to achieve an O.W.L. in the subject and study it further at N.E.W.T.-level, thus showing aptitude in the subject.
• Astronomy: Penny was skilled in Astronomy, as she was able to achieve an O.W.L. in the subject and study it further at N.E.W.T.-level, thus showing aptitude in the subject.
• History of Magic: Penny was skilled in History of Magic, as she was able to achieve an O.W.L. in the subject and study it further at N.E.W.T.-level, thus showing aptitude in the subject.
• Transfiguration: Penny eventually learned how to ably cast the Lovebird to Love Note spell in her fifth year, and was also able to cast both the transforming spell Vera Verto and the Feather Duster to Ferret switching spell successfully in her O.W.L exam.
• Defence Against the Dark Arts: Penny was skilled in Defence Against the Dark Arts, as she was to achieve an O.W.L. in the subject and study it further at N.E.W.T.-level, thus showing aptitude in the subject.
• Flying: Penny had some skill in flying as she constantly took flying lessons with the Main Character, although she had a fear of heights.
• Apparition: Penny was able to Apparate at will.

Trivia

• In Herbology lessons, Penny shared that the Hogwarts greenhouses reminded her of Kew Gardens, where her father used to take her to.
• Her favorite Quidditch team was Wigtown Wanderers. Her favorite player was Ethan Parkin.
• In her fifth year, Snape's criticism of her handling of Beatrice's situation echoed his remarks towards then-fifth year Harry Potter on the principles of Occlumency, considering them weak for being openly emotional and wallowing in their grief. However, given that Snape's loyalties ultimately lay with the protagonists, this could be seen as having been for their own good, and the Main Character was spurred to support Penny and prevent her from a path of self-destruction.
• In Harry Potter: Hogwarts Mystery, the player controls the friendship between the Main Character and Penny, including how to interact with her and what they share with her. They may decide whether to invite Penny with them to the locked room where she helped create the Sleeping Draught.
  • By Year 4, the player is able to express romantic interest in Penny, causing Penny to promise to the player that they will discuss their feelings for each other after Beatrice is rescued. While a large variety of characters are possible dates in side-quests, this occurred prior to their releases and is so far the only such moment in the main story, making Penny the closest thing to a canonical love interest for the Main Character.
  • Penny is one of the four characters available as romance options for all dating side quests: Celestial Ball, First Date, Valentine's Day, Festival Fun, Valentine's Day Ball, and An Enchanted Kiss. While all romance options gain unique outfits and occasionally other appearance changes, Penny is the only one whose hairstyle changes noticeably in every dating side quest, except "An Enchanted Kiss," where none have unique outfits. In 2021, she was remodeled with a casual outfit composed of a shirt with a denim jacket and a skirt.