For loyal Sex and the City enthusiasts, the familiar environs of the show’s main characters (that would be Carrie, Charlotte, Miranda and Samantha) feels like home. Since the Emmy Award-winning series’ inception in 1998, viewers have faithfully followed the trials and tribulations of their daily lives (dating, marriage, divorce, children, and everything in between) set against the inimitable backdrop of Manhattan. From Carrie’s straight-from-the-runway closet brimming with Dior and Dolce to Charlotte’s meticulously tailored residence on Park Avenue, the style-driven interiors – much like the transformative journey of the characters – continue to evolve.
Currently in Season Two, the series sequel And Just Like That… finds the characters (sans Samantha who has a cameo from London) navigating life in their 50s and facing various contemporary issues. Production designer Miguel López-Castillo and set decorator Karin Wiesel Holmes designed the interiors for the remaining trio along with a host of new characters, creating and/or updating restaurants, brownstones, and apartments all over Manhattan as well as the construction of soundstage interiors.
For Holmes, the production design is all about narrative storytelling mixed with a little bit of nostalgia. The Emmy-nominated set decorator, who worked on the original as well as the latest And Just Like That… reboot, found the show often reflected her own life. “I was a huge fan and a single woman in my thirties living in a New York City apartment. Much of what they went through back then and how they lived felt like I was reconnecting with old friends.” Today, she is a wife and mother living on the Upper East Side, much like Charlotte. “I had the unique opportunity to revisit characters I had known so well and reinterpret and support them through the lens of my own life experiences. To be honest, I feel like I identify with a little bit of each one of the girls as it was aspirational for me earlier in the show.”
The original designs for the franchise lead Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker) is a modest Upper East Side (245 E. 73rd Street by way of 66 Perry Street) one-bedroom apartment (that she never gives up), decorated with stacks of fashion magazines, ashtrays, and various flea market finds. Constructed on a soundstage, the apartment’s pièce de resistance, the killer walk-in closet (where she stashes designer treasures that include Lanvin, Dior, Prada, and her later her Vivienne Westwood wedding gown) has a following all its own. “Carrie’s closet is incredible, and there is a lot from Sarah’s own archives and from the original series,” notes Holmes.
Marriage to Mr. Big finds Carrie residing in a Fifth Avenue pad where the designs are decidedly more sophisticated and chic, yet casual and modern. Mid-century furniture, Hollywood glam, Fortuny draperies, and even a serpent-patterned wallpaper for the master bedroom complete the decor. After his death, she finds comfort redecorating her old digs, creating a custom eye-catching accent wall with a large aqua blue carnation patterned wallpaper. Parker developed the “Townhouse” pattern with her interior designer Eric Hughes as part of her line with Wallshoppe (and for the commitment-phobic, it’s peel and stick). Holmes also notes that Carrie’s new bamboo flower bedlinens from Calvin Klein are so popular that it’s now sold out.
One of the more swoon-worthy interiors is Charlotte York Goldblatt’s (Kristin Davis) 930 Park Avenue co-op. Formerly married to a doctor, the apartment’s look was conventional, conservative, and decidedly Scottish, reflecting her husband’s roots (Holmes recalls the show’s joke about the former designs being a “place where plaid goes to die”). Happily married to her divorce attorney and living with their two teenage daughters Rock and Lily, her look is feminine and fresh with lots of cream, white, pink, and peach tones.
A modern all-white kitchen, a piano room with contemporary artwork (painted by the film’s scenic designer), and F. Schumacher’s Toile De Femmes wallcovering for the daughter’s bedroom are a few of the distinctive design touches. The dining room, with its pink and cream patterned drapes and wallpaper, is most representative of the owner. “Charlotte’s dining room was one of my favourite ‘Charlotte spaces,’” details Holmes. And as a classic example of Mies van der Rohe’s famous quote, “God is in the details,” the set decorator asked the scenic department to create some new artwork, namely portraits of her dogs Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton which, the decorator notes, “seemed like a very Charlotte thing to do.”
Another stand-out interior is Charlotte’s new friend and documentarian Lisa Todd Wexley’s (Nicole Ari Parker) apartment that she shares with her lawyer husband and three children. Wexley is an avid art collector, philanthropist, fashionista, and classic A-type personality. “Last season, all we saw was her entry way and dining room that was mostly white,” Holmes explains. “This season we decided to tie in her art collection.” Works by Richard Mayhew and African American artists Gordon Parks’ and Carrie Mae Weems’s photographs, Mickalene Thomas’s Portrait of Mnonja and Deborah Roberts’s Political Lamb in a Wolf’s World dot the walls. Her enviable walk-in closet is another show-stopper and includes a why-didn’t-I-think-of-this caramel button-tufted leather swinging door to separate the “his and her” spaces with a fabulous Murano glass chandelier sourced in France. Doubling as a home office, she explains: “We knew there were going to be scenes working on her documentary and repurposed the vanity as a workspace.”
For Holmes, there is not a typical day working as a set decorator. “It’s all about the research, reading the script, and laying out what will be the look for the season. We research what we know about the characters, and in our show, we can go back in time and have so much backstory,” Holmes details. “I look at what they wear, what do we know, what is their situation, and how long did they live in their home. What do they read and listen to? Are they clean or messy, who decorated the apartment and is there an accumulation of things over the years, or did she have to decorate?” And in another case of details, details, details, she occasionally grabs local dry cleaning and grocery bags on the Upper East Side along with menus and receipts for additional props. Carrie even has her very own library card!
And Just Like That… will be back for more comedy, drama, ladies who lunch, cosmopolitans, Oscar de la Rentas and Carrie’s aptly named cat Shoe in Season Three. Stay tuned.
Read more: Interior Designers I Interiors | Design | Production Design | New York