Bridgerton Season 3 Costume & HMU Desginers Break Down Penelope’s Old Hollywood Glamour Look

Bridgerton‘s highly anticipated return inches ever closer, with the first 4 episodes of season 3 coming to on Netflix on May 16. While the series is adapted from Julia Quinn’s novels and follows each of the Bridgerton siblings’ romances in successive order, season 3 skips its respective book and instead tackles Colin Bridgerton’s (Luke Newton) courtship of Penelope Featherington (Derry Girls‘ Nicola Coughlan). The two characters have been close for years, though Colin remains oblivious to his friend’s crush on him — not to mention to her secret identity as Lady Whistledown.

One of the most interesting aspects of adapting Colin’s book for Bridgerton season 3 is how the show handles Penelope’s new look, which takes place off-page in the novel series. Naturally, costume designer John Glaser and hair & makeup designer Erika Ökvist are responsible for finding the perfect color palette and fashion choices to represent the changes Penelope undergoes. Rather than changing her style for purely cosmetic purposes, Penelope is calculating how best to find a husband in order to escape her mother and sisters’ shadows.

Screen Rant interviewed Glaser and Ökvist about how they approached Penelope Featherington’s makeover in Bridgeton season 3, as well as what guided them when turning Hannah Dodd into the new Francesca Bridgerton. The duo also teased some of the exciting balls to come later in the season, and the complexity of the Netflix show blending historical fiction with fantasy.

Penelope Glows Up & The Featheringtons Stay Fashion-Forward In Bridgerton Season 3

Screen Rant: Erika, Penelope’s makeover or glow-up in the books is a big turning point for her, but it works slightly differently on the show. What went into her taking charge of her look when it comes to the makeup and hair?

Erika Ökvist: She’s basically taking charge of her own life. She decides that by taking charge of her own look, she will get to the goal that she has set up for herself, which is to get married. She obviously went out and thought, “Okay, what can I do to get that to happen?” And so we are going into the world of old Hollywood glamor and making her look as sexy and as desirable as possible.

We are basing her looks very much within that era, with Hollywood waves similar to Jessica Rabbit or even Marilyn Monroe; that kind of knock-out beauty. Therefore, we changed her hair into that kind of shape, and the makeup obviously is going to follow that aesthetic too. She has a really marked cat eye, the eyebrows shape, and the cheekbones going all the way up to God. And then, of course, the skin that literally looks like melted butter.

When setting the color palette and bringing costumes, hair, and makeup together, who comes first?

John Glaser: This time, because of the first glow-up when we see her at the ball, we actually followed the color that Erika was using for her hair. If you look at that costume closely, the underlayers are actually bronze and green, so it’s a reference to the Featheringtons, but making it a cohesive look.

After that moment, because she has become empowered, we talked about Hollywood glamor for her clothing and silhouette line. Nicola has such a great face and body that we, instead of hiding it, enhanced it and followed the shape of her body. She instantly fell into a nice Marilyn Monroe-esque 1950s shape, and that’s where we ended up. It looks good on her. It doesn’t look out of place; you don’t notice it. She just looks beautiful now.

Penelope isn’t the only one in different circumstances, as we see both elder Featherington sisters become matriarchs of their own households this year. Can you talk about how the DNA looks for those characters change this season, if at all?

Erika Ökvist: The Featherington sisters have also evolved. Like I’ve always said, they would go to the equivalent of fashion week. They wouldn’t be caught dead with last season’s outfits or hairstyle. They all have to evolve; it’s not just Penelope who has to do it because of something that is scripted visually. We have got to let all of the characters evolve, otherwise the season won’t be believable.

Francesca Bridgerton Makes Her Grand (Re-)Entrance

We have a new actor playing Francesca, and we’re getting to know her for the first time. What conversations did you have with Jess to settle on what look best encapsulates the quiet music-lover within? Was any consideration given to continuity with the previous actor?

John Glaser: This is one area where we really didn’t think about continuity. Because you’ve changed the actress, we’re not forcing anything on her. We strictly went with the new actual person and built her character off that. When you look at her, there’s not many choices that you have to make. She is definitely a princess; she’s definitely a Bridgerton.

Her clothing is very simple. It just has a shape that suits her body. That’s not a hard question to answer, but we based her on Katherine Hepburn in the 1940s. If you look at the sheer blouses that she wears, that look is youthful, but it’s tasteful and not that restrictive Regency look. Her clothes are translucent because she is a mystery. She’s going to be a mystery to the audience, and she’s a little mysterious in the actual show because she is essentially a new character. We didn’t want to try to make her look like the previous actress, so we gave her a new look.

How Bridgerton Season 3’s Themed Balls Came Together

The balls this season are bigger, better, and more themed than ever. Do you each have either a ball or another large set piece that was the most challenging or exciting to work on for the characters within that scene?

John Glaser: For me, the most challenging ball was the last one.

Erika Ökvist: The last ball was the Queen’s Ball, where we had the [Eros and Psyche] ballet. It was one of the weeks that I had just been dying to do since season 2, but there was never a right time for it in season 2. Then finally, we had this ballet and then I was thinking, “Well, what would be great for the ballet?” She’s got moving pieces within her wig, so we printed this clockwork platform and got some motors so that I’ve got some swans swimming around this kind of Faberge egg-shaped wig. I think that the biggest problem with that one was to make it quiet enough for the sound man not to want to kill me. [Laughs] That was difficult.

But every ball, I get overexcited and start spinning around with loads of ideas. I’ll go to John, and we sit and talk about things, and then we look at some fabrics.

John Glaser: Because it is fantasy, this ball had women wearing Greek clothing, so it was the first time that we actually had to follow a look from history. It was not difficult for us, but we made a commitment to make it look like this and had to follow through. We couldn’t veer off too far – although we did, of course.

Erika Ökvist: Of course, it’s the same thing with the hair and the makeup. But the other reason I think we’ve got more people involved in these balls is that there is no more COVID lockdown. That was a big thing in season 2, where we had restrictions on how many people we could have in a room. That restriction didn’t happen in season 3, so within the first two weeks, we had as many extras as we had for almost the whole of season 2. It was crazy.

John Glaser: This season, we really follow the name of the ball and follow what the production design is doing so that it becomes one big moment. Each ball definitely looks different than the next, and none of it is historically accurate. Every historian is going to shake their heads.

Erika Ökvist: But we are following through. There’s no point in dithering. We created a world, and we have to follow that through and fulfill it. Because if you don’t, then you’re neither here nor there. You’ve got to commit, and you either go there or you don’t.

About Bridgerton Season 3

Bridgerton is back for its third season and finds Penelope Featherington (Nicola Coughlan) has finally given up on her long-held crush on Colin Bridgerton (Luke Newton) after hearing his disparaging words about her last season. She has, however, decided it’s time to take a husband, preferably one who will provide her with enough independence to continue her double life as Lady Whistledown, far away from her mother and sisters. But lacking in confidence, Penelope’s attempts on the marriage mart fail spectacularly. Meanwhile, Colin has returned from his summer travels with a new look and a serious sense of swagger. But he’s disheartened to realize that Penelope, the one person who always appreciated him as he was, is giving him the cold shoulder.

Eager to win back her friendship, Colin offers to mentor Penelope in the ways of confidence to help her find a husband this season. But when his lessons start working a little too well, Colin must grapple with whether his feelings for Penelope are truly just friendly. Complicating matters for Penelope is her rift with Eloise (Claudia Jessie), who has found a new friend in a very unlikely place, while Penelope’s growing presence in the ton makes it all the more difficult to keep her Lady Whistledown alter ego a secret.

Check out our other Bridgerton season interviews with:

• Bessie Carter (Prudence Featherington)
• Alison Gartshore (Production Designer) & Phillip Corps (Florist)
• Justin Kamps & Sarah Bridges (Music Supervisors), Kris Bowers (Composer) & Jack Murphy (Choreographer)