Having been almost a decade since the final episode of the original Gossip Girl series, HBOmax decided it was time for a new era of fashionable “New York Elite” to take the stage, and with an updated series comes updated fashion Eric Daman, the costume designer who styled the original series, joined the cast & crew for the second time to bring the reboot to life. With this newfound vision came bolder risks with school uniforms and partnerships with real life brands. A day before the series aired on July 8th, MONSE hosted a fashion show with looks inspired by the new series and more specifically, Julian Calloway’s character. The show debuted 22 new looks and was streamed live so that fans of the brand and the show were able to watch the models walk the runway in real time.

Along with the debut of the MONSE Fall 2021 line the livestream also included an interview with the co-founders of MONSE and a sneak peak into some looks from the reboot. Along with being co-founders of the brand, Laura Kim and Fernando Garcia also act as the creative directors. Kim and Garcia emphasize how important school and uniforms were to their fall line. With Gossip girl taking place mainly amongst high school students at a private school, it was important to them to create their take on this traditionally preppy environment. Kim spoke of how when they saw photos of the new cast they were immediately drawn to Jordan Alexander, who plays Julien Calloway, and knew she was meant to be the main inspiration for the line. Eric Daman even ended up using one of these looks on Julien in the first season of the show.

Julian Calloway

Above Jordan Alexander can be seen wearing a pair of Jimmy Choo boots along with a sweater from the MONSE line she helped inspire. Alexander’s character is the new “It-girl” of the series. Daman really wanted to personalize the school uniforms when it came to each character, but especially for Calloway as her role outside of school is as a social media influencer and model. In one of her school outfits Julian is put in a Saint Laurent varsity jacket sporting a “CB” patch on the left side to represent the iconic “Constance Billard” along with a pair of biker shorts. Daman mentioned that taking big designer brands and adding customizations of school pins, patches, and logos to turn them into uniforms is something they added to the new series that they never attempted in the original. This allowed more leniency with the outfits and made it easier to create identifiable aesthetics for each character. Julien uses the personalization of uniforms to create an “off duty model” look with her schoolwear.

Zoya Lott

Played by Whitney Peak, Zoya is the incoming freshman and Julien’s half-sister. Having just moved from Buffalo, Zoya is the “normal” kid in a sea of New York’s wealthiest who is attending Constance on a scholarship in hopes of getting into a University with a first-rate drama program. On top of that she is mentioned to be “an activist and a writer” which is what they try to convey through her personalization of the uniforms. Throughout the series she can be seen carrying tote bags for different local black-owned businesses and sporting pins for different civil rights organizations. Lott can be seen adding Constance patches to her wardrobe much like her half-sister, but Zoya’s is ironed onto a thrifted J.Crew polo rather than Saint Laurent. 

Max Wolfe

Max Wolfe, played by Thomas Doherty, is given a new signature look with the Brooks Brothers tie from the original series being turned into a bowtie specifically for him. Daman wanted to use Wolfe to help break down fashion gender norms within the show. In the first episode the characters attend a Christopher John Rogers fashion show that Julien is walking in and Max can be seen sporting a women’s Paco Rabanne blouse in the audience. A lot of his character can be shown not just by the clothing but also how he wears it. The biggest thing with Wolfe is that whether he’s wearing a woman’s blouse or a Constance bomber jacket he’s wearing it with more confidence than anyone else in the room. 

Audrey Hope

If Emily Alyn Lind’s character Audrey Hope could be described in one word it would be classic. She takes inspiration from Grace Kelly type looks by sporting many button ups and form fitting dresses with feminine silhouettes throughout the series. Hope’s take on the Constance uniform is a striped Balmain sweater which Eric Daman describes as making her look like “a high fashion ragdoll”. They took many “old-world” silhouettes such as the Rosario dress she wears in the second episode to their school's fundraiser, but modernized it by having cutouts in the design and  allowing more skin to show.

Kate Keller

Kate Keller portrayed by Tavi Gevinson on-screen is a teacher at Constance Billard and also revealed to be the one behind the Gossip Girl Instagram page (along with some of her fellow teachers) in the first episode. Eric Daman stated how Keller’s first day of school outfit is an homage to the outfit we see Serena van der Woodsen in the original pilot episode as she steps off the train at Grand Central. Most of the main teachers in the show are around the same age as the characters from the original series so it makes sense that Kate would take inspiration from Serena as she would have been the fashion “It-girl” that Keller followed through page-six as a teenager herself. 

Daman ends the segment by talking about how everyone can recreate looks from the new reboot. Rather than in the original where all the looks were very one of a kind and “campy”, as Daman puts it, thus harder to recreate without purchasing a designer product, the newer show is more understated with its fashion. While all the characters still wear designer clothes, it’s much easier to find a red varsity jacket not made by Saint Laurent in a thrift store or even online to recreate a Julien Calloway look than it would be to find one of Blair’s hundreds of designer dresses. Daman also mentions how the best fashion advice he could give would be that “fashion is 20% style and 80% confidence” which is one of the reasons the characters in Gossip Girl are known for their iconic outfits, they wear the clothes with confidence.

XOXO,

Crystal Crush