The Women of 'White Lotus' Season 3 Are Like Bravo Meets Goop

One thing about the women of The White Lotus Thailand—they’d all shop at Erewhon. The Venn diagram of luxury spa-goers in Southeast Asia and ladies who spend too much on sea moss gummies is a circle. It’s easy to imagine Jaclyn (Michelle Monaghan) filling her cart with quinoa salad and Manuka honey after a Pilates class—that’s where she got the Erewhon tote from, duh. Laurie (Carrie Coon), who I would bet first heard about the legendary grocery store after The New York Times profile, might stop in for the Buffalo cauliflower, just so she can roll her eyes and call it “overrated.” And Kate (Leslie Bibb), always one step behind her famous bestie, would certainly wait in line for a pink Hailey Bieber smoothie after scrolling past it on Instagram. I just know it.

L.A.'s Erewhon in The Grove attracts plenty of mysteriously wealthy yet unemployed types like Chloe (Charlotte Le Bon), who probably craves a bit of overpriced dried mango after a long hard day of shopping. Even Victoria Ratliff (Parker Posey) seems like she’d wander in the Santa Monica location and blissfully drop $16 on a single organic strawberry after popping a Lorazepam.

This delusional wellness lady archetype comes in many forms, but as Mike White seems to understand, has a certain shared out-of-touch-ness that makes her excellent television. And each has a certain look, one that costume designer Alex Bovaird nails in season 3.

"I really took my inspiration from reality," says Bovaird. She cites Gwyneth Paltrow's Goop as "a website that I have been looking at since season 1" for inspiration. For season 3, though, she turned up the volume on the L.A. wellness culture. "We did prep a little bit in Los Angeles, and Brentwood women who have that [look]. They're in touch with a bit of glamour because they're living in Hollywood, but they're also very much into health, wellness, and beauty: the right smells, the right treatments, and the right products."

This "Brentwood woman" vibe finds its expression best in Jaclyn Lemon, an anxiously aging actress who comes to the White Lotus for a girls' trip, as well as in her childhood friends Laurie Duffy and Kate Bohr. This trio has the built-up resentments and competitive dynamics one would expect in a group of powerful, slightly toxic women who've known each other for decades—and the clothes reflect that. "They were sort of my Sex and the City, ladies," she explains. "They are dressing for each other."

Put simply, these three have the same closets, different font. "We started off by dressing them and buying for them as one cohesive blob," says Bovaird, who wanted their influence on each other to be visually apparent. "Then as the actresses appeared, we tailored it a little bit to who they were." The group ringleader, Jaclyn, has the most distinct personal aesthetic. Bovaird and her team intentionally styled the other two as "just trying to keep up" with her It Girl fashion, imagining that the successful TV actress might receive a "big box of goodies from Valentino" or an ambassador handbag from Hermès.

There was a real actress and style icon who inspired the fictional Jaclyn: Sienna Miller. "She was a big influence on how I put Jaclyn together," says Bovaird, who has worked with Miller on previous projects. "She's amazingly cool and bohemian, a little bit rock and roll, stylish, and old movie star, and she encapsulates everything about a cool actress."

Kate, on the other hand, was more of a classic rich mom type, a Cartier Love bracelet wearer, if you will. Laurie, with her high-powered law career, recent divorce, and daughter, keeps her style more functional and down-to-earth—much like the traveler pants she wears to explore Thailand in episode 4.

Perhaps the most delusional of all the show's wellness women, Victoria Ratliff, has a more conservative prep style of dressing in Thailand; Bovaird worked closely with Parker Posey to outfit her character. "We were both inspired by this website called Tuckernuck," says Bovaird. She and Posey landed on this idea of a "coastal U.S. woman with a sort of preppy vibe, but also bold colors," after scrolling through the brand's site and sending each other favorites. "We had this idea of this lady who just doesn't get out in the sun, and sort of can't be bothered with all that. She is just slightly out of it, in her caftan and big glasses, and not really enjoying the spoils of Thailand."

Those caftans and big glasses have become something of an Instagram sensation since the show premiered in February, and Bovaird says she constantly gets DMs asking for details. "People have been private messaging me a lot about sunglasses, and they're custom made for her by a company called General Eyewear," she explains, adding that she wanted something "eccentric" and "Jackie O" for the character. The caftans, too, are something of a one-of-a-kind piece sourced from a vintage seller in Alabama.

The standout Fashion with a capital "F" girl of The White Lotus, however, is Chloe, played by Le Bon, the yacht girl and possibly professional girlfriend of Greg (who fans may remember as Tanya McQuoid's husband from season 2). Unlike the more understated resort goers, she lives the vacation life in Thailand full time, and her clothes are flashier and trendier as a result.

"I worked closely with Jacquemus to create some special looks for her," says Bovaird. The French designer had been a dream White Lotus collaborator of the costume designer's for years, but it wasn't until season 3 that she had the right character to wear his sexy South of France resort-wear. Luckily, Chloe came along just in time. "I love the Jacquemus she wears at the end of episode one. It doesn't get enough air time, but it's this amazing polka dot body suit."

Chloe wears showy, steal-your-boyfriend's-credit-card designer duds, like an electric blue Balenciaga bag or silk pink sarongs just because she can. "She has a moment where she saunters back into Greg's house, and she's wearing a Givenchy robe—like she couldn't be bothered to get dressed from the yacht," says the costume designer. She's the DGAF girlfriend who's not afraid to spend someone else's money or flaunt the goods.

Overall, the character's costumes had to strike the right balance of fantasy and fallibility, sort of like a good Bravo TV show. "I watched the whole of Below Deck Thailand, and then I got totally hooked," says Bovaird. She used the show, along with another Bravoverse favorite, Southern Charm, to get a sense of what the Ratliffs might actually wear on vacation.

It's the perfect reference point: The White Lotus delivers all the absorbed reality star antics you'd expect from any Andy Cohen production—just with a side of cultural commentary and some murder. And that's why we love it.

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