“You Really Should Update Your Wardrobe”
Costume Design on Season Four of Gilmore Girls
Originally published on Letterdrop 9/8/2022
I’ll admit, season four is my favorite—always has been, always will be. But when I rewatched it this past year, I struggled to articulate why. The fourth season is Gilmore Girls at its most uneven. The show either follows through on long-marinating story lines (Emily realizing Richard doesn’t respect her and dumping his ass; Lorelai opening her own inn and coming to terms with her feelings for Luke; Lane revealing her secret life to her mother) or goes off in baffling directions (Rory doing nothing at Yale but finding the perfect “study tree” and pining after married Dean; Paris dating a crusty professor). Then I realized the appeal of season four was right in front of me: It was always the costumes.
Note the corduroy blazer and the perplexed look. Yeah, I don’t know why you still like Dean either, hon (4.4).
With no uniform to fall back on, Rory must become a little more fashion conscious in college, even cutting her hair into a sleek bob. Her go-to pieces are collared shirts under sweaters, mini- or pencil skirts over tights—preppy and academic but with the playful colors and patterns that make her a Gilmore. For jewelry, she sticks to a pair of sparkly drop earrings, a wink at her mother’s signature diamond studs.
Rory in 4.12
While high school Rory shopped from more accessible catalog brands like Alloy, her backpack Eddie Bauer, college Rory favors higher-end brands like Anthropologie and Marc Jacobs—perhaps thanks to the growing input, and sizable pocketbook, of Emily Gilmore. Says costume designer Brenda Maben: “When [Rory] arrived at [Yale] she was still focused [on school], but paid more attention to how she looked, and with the influence of her grandmother . . . her taste became more sophisticated” (Page Six).
Don’t let anyone tell you the aughts wasn’t an age of innovation: Look at all the ways we layered shirts (4.3).
As we’ll see later this season, Emily’s primary means of influence is taste, whether it be through clothes shopping, party planning, or interior designing. In episode three, Emily secretly redecorates Rory’s common room in a cacophony of pink and yellow ginghams and florals, maybe a touch more youthful and kitschy than the Gilmore mansion’s furnishings but far pricier than what the average college student would own. Rory worries that the redecoration will give her the “upper hand” with her roommates, but that’s exactly what Emily intended. Redecorating is Emily’s way of claiming territory: We saw it in season one, when Emily redid a bedroom for Rory (1.19), and we’ll see it in season six, when Emily will makeover the pool house for Rory.
Emily’s redecoration doesn’t give Rory an advantage at Yale—in fact, Rory seems lost this whole season: She struggles with her course load, seemingly makes no long-term friends aside from a fellow freshman named Marty (who is really just a red-herring love interest).
Rejection, part one (4.8)
Rejection, part two (4.8)
Even at the Yale Daily News, Rory has trouble finding her footing: The paper’s editor, Doyle McMaster, rejects two of her articles in a row (4.8). Each time, he is wearing a button-down and necktie, sartorially above Rory in her casual sweaters.
Finally, acceptance (4.8)
Only once he accepts her article—a scathing (and fatphobic) review of a Yale ballet—can they be on the same level, both in sweaters.
Liz in 4.12
Liz in 4.13
Rory spends the latter half of the season retreading high school relationships, with Jess and Dean. Jess reappears in episode twelve, but first comes his mother, Liz. She is, to quote Lorelai, a “rock and roll hippie chick”: tie-dye scarves and fringy suede jackets and dream catcher earrings. After years of struggling with alcohol, drugs, and bad boyfriends, Liz has finally found success selling handmade jewelry on the Renaissance fair circuit with her sweet lug of a boyfriend, T.J. She’s delighted to have all her “guys”—T.J., Jess, and her brother, Luke—in town at one time, even if the latter two are waiting for Liz’s life to implode again.
Jess and Luke (4.12)
In the metaphorical record store of life, Liz is wandering somewhere around Fleetwood Mac and Jess is taking a sharp right to the Ramones. He’s come back into town to get his car, looking even more hardened than he did when he left: black leather motorcycle jacket over a gray hoodie and black T-shirt, black jeans, and a black knit cap. (I’d like to think the gray hoodie was inspired by Lorelai’s Rocky reference in 4.13.)
Not Rory (4.13)
Rory (4.13)
As Jess waits for Gypsy (yeah, I know) to repair his car, he catches sight of a long-haired brunette in brown corduroy pants and an olive jacket with fur trim (4.13). It’s not Rory, as Gypsy informs him: “She cut her hair.” Later, when Jess runs into the real Rory at the bakery and the bookstore, she’s wearing corduroys and an olive jacket with fur trim, just like her doppelgänger was. There’s still an intuitive connection between Jess and Rory, even if they don’t know the details of their lives without each other—or how to express their feelings. Jess tells Rory he loves her, then drives away, his leather jacket still marking him as the “bad boy,” the boy who leaves.
Jess in 4.20
Remember Jess’s Punk Planet T from season two (4.21)?
In episode twenty, Liz and T.J. decide to get married, and at Luke’s encouragement, Jess returns for the wedding. He looks so much softer now, in striped T-shirts and a Luke-like plaid button-down. At the wedding, Jess walks Liz down the aisle, his cream button-down matching her antique lace dress. He even helps Luke pick out a tie for the ceremony: a red one that complements Lorelai’s pink halter dress.
Jess and Liz (4.21)
An all-time favorite Lorelai look (4.21)
Indeed, both Luke and Jess are helping each other express their feelings for their respective Gilmore girls—and their appreciation for each other. (Luke telling Jess that he’s “always here” will never not bring a single tear to my eye.) And yet, when Jess does seek out Rory, he finds her with Dean, and all his newfound communication skills leave him.
Go home to your lovely wife, Dean (4.21).
He’s back in his leather jacket, back to running away: He asks Rory to “come away” with him, and she refuses. Jess leaves again, so much still unsaid.
Good deal on artichokes, though (4.21)
Which brings me, unfortunately, to Dean. Fucking Dean. At the beginning of the season, Dean gets married, though he still harbors feelings for Rory (4.4). Lindsay keeps his house, brings his lunch to work—everything he’s supposedly wanted since 1.14—but he’s still unsatisfied. He dresses as he did in high school—sporty T-shirts and polos—because that’s who he remains: obsessed with Rory and not much else. The only real difference is his hair. It’s so thick this season. Why is it so thick?
Rory’s room (4.22)
I hope I’m not the first to inform you, dear reader, that Rory and Dean have sex (4.22). He tells her his marriage is over, and she believes him.
Please stop, you’ll make a big . . .
. . . well, shit (4.22).
Before Rory sleeps with Dean, she’s wearing a pink shrug over a pink sleeveless dress. After, the shrug is gone, exposing more of the cream lace camisole underneath and the intimacy that has just occurred. When Lorelai comes home, she quickly understands what happened, both from Rory’s and Dean’s mussed clothes and the mussed sheets in Rory’s childhood bedroom. Like the dress, the sheets are pink, a color somewhere between girlhood and womanhood, between naïvete and knowing.
The aftermath (4.22)
After Lorelai and Rory fight, Rory goes outside to call Dean, grabbing a tan corduroy jacket on the way. When Lindsay answers Dean’s phone, Rory finally realizes the marriage is far from over and breaks down in tears. She tightens the jacket around her, covering the dress and the brief delusion it represents.
If you need a moment to rinse your eyeballs with soap, now is a good time. Once you’re done, let’s talk about the rest of season four: It can only go up from here.
Love the koi print on Sookie’s smock (4.3)
Lorelai, Sookie, and Michel spend the season opening the Dragonfly Inn and adjusting to life outside of the Independence Inn. As their work lives change, so do their clothes.
Sookie is adrift without her kitchen: She passes most of the season in casual tops and jeans instead of the smocks and slacks she wore while working. The exception is episode three, when Sookie and Lorelai take their first catering job, a child’s birthday party (4.3). Sookie is back in her uniform and treating the party like it’s the Independence Inn, where she made adventurous offerings for adults rather than mac and cheese for picky kids.
You can’t tell me Michel wouldn’t be running this place in a month (4.4).
Michel is working at a sleek, modern New York hotel, the antithesis of the homey future Dragonfly or the stately Independence Inn. To quote Lorelai, it’s “where all those Calvin Klein ads went to die” (4.4).
Like the rest of his beautiful coworkers, Michel wears a fitted black sweater, black belted slacks, and a headset. He pretends to be thriving at his new job, to have no interest in following Lorelai and Sookie to the Dragonfly, but he obviously hates his coworkers—and his uniform. How can Michel—he of the impeccable suits and neckties—be happy looking like everyone else?
Michel in 4.8
Even on his casual days, Michel wears crisp printed button-downs and luxurious suede jackets. A minimalist he is not.
Unlike Michel, Lorelai has no job to fall back on; unlike Sookie, she has no spouse with his own income. As the season goes on, Lorelai struggles more and more with money, and repeats more and more clothes. And so, the most interesting part of Lorelai’s costume design becomes not what is new but what is not.
Lorelai in 4.14
Episode fourteen is the tipping point: Lorelai is so desperate that she asks Luke for a loan and, for the first time since season two, wears her red fur-lined jacket.
Oh look, it’s the jacket Not Rory was wearing. Did Rory donate it to a town rummage sale (2.11)?
The jacket was a staple that season; Lorelai even wore it in episode 2.11, after she took another loan from her parents. A return to the jacket feels like a return to the precarious early years, when any unexpected expense could mean financial ruin for the girls.
Sookie, Lorelai, and their short-lived interior designer Natalie (4.5)
Never mind that Emily rewears her jackets all the time (4.15).
By episode fifteen, even Emily notes Lorelai’s repeats: “I’ve seen that [dress] on you a dozen times. You really should update your wardrobe.” Emily lives in a world of plenty, where it would never occur to her that Lorelai’s rewears are a necessity, not a choice.
Rory got the branding guide (4.22).
With Luke’s loan, Lorelai makes it to the Dragonfly’s test run. She even wears a dragonfly graphic T, paired with a mint-striped blazer, the day before the opening (4.22).
I spy some mint (4.22).
Mint seems to be a Dragonfly color: the bellhops are in mint button-downs and khakis. For the opening, Lorelai chooses a brown wrap blouse and a blue-and-brown-chevron skirt (4.22). She matches the warm, wood-lined interior of the inn and Luke, in a brown sweater. At long last, on the Dragonfly front porch, they kiss.
Finally (4.22)!
Unfortunately, Lorelai has spent most of the season secretly dating Jason “Digger” Stiles, Richard’s new business partner. Jason wants to break away from his father’s insurance company, where Richard was slowly ousted in season two. Their partnership fulfills both Jason’s and Richard’s desire to finally stick it to Floyd Stiles.
Note Richard’s buttoned and Jason’s unbuttoned suit jackets (4.6)
Jason is hungry, desperate for success and approval, young and ostentatious next to the established and sophisticated Gilmores. He’s still rich but not the right kind of rich. His suits aren’t custom-made like Richard’s; they never fit him quite right. His patterned shirts and neckties clash; his beard is scruffy. Jason is, to put it plainly, always striving but never quite succeeding.
See how untailored Jason’s suit looks next to Richard’s (4.6)?
Emily is initially excited about Jason and Richard’s partnership: She arranges for a photograph of their contract signing; she plans to throw them an elegant launch party. After decades of supporting Richard’s career, Emily sees exactly what is required, exactly how things should look. She even asks Richard to find out what Jason is wearing to the party, so they won’t show up “looking like the Bobbsey Twins” (4.6).
Shout-out to Dan Humphrey: Sookie and Lorelai in classic black-and-white catering wear (4.6)
Emily goes about planning her party, with Lorelai and Sookie as her catering company. She knows what she wants down to the detail, from the “simple bone china with a gold or deep-blue stripe” to the “white and sterling roses.”
Again, loose and unbuttoned (4.6)
Jason has something else in mind for their clients: a trip to Atlantic City. He wants to “get everybody out, away from business, away from their spouses, away from stuffy cocktail party music and floral arrangements.” According to Jason, “every other company in town is throwing a dignified cocktail party,” including his own mother. Emily is not just old-fashioned, she’s unoriginal.
Again, fitted and buttoned (4.6)
Richard likes the idea of doing things differently, and he agrees to the trip over Emily’s objections. He and Jason look more alike than they ever have: both in black suits and white shirts, Richard’s gold bow tie picking up the bursts of gold in Jason’s necktie. They’re becoming the Bobbsey Twins Emily feared.
Please stop bringing these back (4.6).
And so, Emily must tell Lorelai that the party is canceled. Neither can hide their disappointment. “Times change, Lorelai,” Emily says. “Things that were once considered proper and elegant are now considered stuffy and out-of-date. . . . Like canapés and cocktail parties and the people who plan them.” Only a few minutes before, Emily was baffled by Lorelai’s Juicy Couture track pants, “Juicy” across the butt. The world is changing—becoming, in Emily’s eyes, more vulgar, more tawdry, more Atlantic City—and she can’t change with it.
Again, Emily’s power in her world, in her marriage, comes from her taste. By episode fifteen, Emily can feel her influence with Richard slipping away: He’s lied to her about lunches with his old flame, Pennilyn; he’s having dinner with Jason at trendy restaurants; he’s grown a mustache, his version of Jason’s beard. Emily decides to do what Richard thinks she does: shop. She may not make her family’s money, but she can choose how it’s spent.
Note the coral stripe in Lorelai’s sweater vest (a repeat from 4.5) . . .
At the mall, Emily runs into Lorelai and Rory, both broke and window-shopping. They’re perfectly coordinated in their leather jackets and striped tops, inside-joke roses pinned to their lapels. Emily stands apart in a fur-trimmed coat and one of her signature tweed jackets.
. . . which links Lorelai to Emily, in pale orange (4.15).
She drags Lorelai and Rory through a department store, one she obviously frequents, as the store clerks know her by name and have Richard’s measurements on file. First, Emily buys things for her home: a set of china she hasn’t seen, decorative glass apples she doesn’t need. Then, she shops for Richard:
Pull the latest Brionis in an assortment of colors and charge them to our account. . . . Include accessories and three pairs of loafers. Italian. They should feel like butter. Make it four. Hell, make it six. And jewelry. Add an assortment of jewelry appropriate for a man with a mustache. What would that be, bracelets, pinky rings? And a mustache comb, the most expensive you’ve got.
Emily is acting out her frustration with Richard, and his changing tastes, through her purchases. She thinks his mustache is vulgar, like she thinks Jason is vulgar, so she’ll buy Richard jewelry and a pricey comb out of spite.
Rory and Lorelai examine the purchases (4.15).
Finally, Emily’s eye turns to Lorelai and Rory. She wants to buy them feathered hats, diamond watches, Manolo Blahniks. She even gets Lorelai a wedding dress—Vera Wang—behind her back. That evening, Lorelai and Rory take inventory of Emily’s other “gifts,” among them a turquoise leather jacket, a Life Savers holder, and “hair clips with diamond Betty Boops.”
Oddly, at no point during this department store sweep do we see Emily buy herself clothes and accessories. Perhaps this department store doesn’t carry Emily’s go-to suits: the brand likely St. John, as a reader (and the owner of my hometown consignment store!), Elyssa, pointed out. According to Elyssa, St. John makes both the classic styles Emily wears and ones with wilder prints and embellishments. “Emily would probably be reminded of her daughter while shopping there,” maybe take pleasure in “buying the demure styles with funky touches.”
I imagine Emily probably takes a similar enjoyment in buying Lorelai and Rory kitschy things in expensive trappings—like those diamond Betty Boop barrettes. It’s her act of rebellion, spending Richard’s money on “worthless” things, but ultimately, one that goes unnoticed by its target. At dinner, Emily points out her new glass apples, in a bowl at the center of the table. “Oh,” says Richard, “I’ve always liked those.”
The dingy color only makes the robe more tragic (4.16).
Their marriage only disintegrates from there: In episode sixteen, Richard’s mother, Trix, dies, and he falls into grief—wearing, god forbid, a robe in the middle of the day. (Later, Richard forgets how to tie a bow tie, something he must’ve done thousands of times before.)
Lorelai will never unsee (4.16).
Emily takes up her mother-in-law’s funeral preparations, then drops them when she finds a carbon copy of a letter Trix wrote to Richard, discouraging him from marrying Emily. Lorelai must assume the remaining funeral preparations—in an Emily tweed coat, naturally—while Emily lounges about the house in her own robe, smoking and drinking and reading The Crimson Petal and the White.
The rose print calls back to her book’s title (4.16).
“Apparently, we’re a robe family now,” says Lorelai—meaning a family without decorum, without dignity, without a separation between public and private. Only the episode before, Emily was screaming about Richard’s mustache in the shoe department. She’s driven herself to the vulgarity she so feared at the beginning of the season: She doesn’t even care if Jason sees her in her robe.
In episode nineteen, Emily and Richard secretly separate after Richard, yet again, dismisses Emily’s feelings. Richard has sacrificed Jason to save himself from Floyd’s lawsuit, and Emily worries his betrayal will drive Lorelai away. Though Lorelai ultimately chooses her parents over Jason, the damage to the Gilmore marriage is done.
Barely holding it together (4.19)
Emily and Richard can’t hide their separation from the girls: For Friday Night Dinner, Emily arrives fresh from her hotel, in a gray Burberry cardigan, white top, and gray slacks, her handbag clutched to her side. It’s the most casual she’s ever looked for dinner: a clear sign that something isn’t right and a foreshadowing of the strangeness will come in season five, as the Gilmores navigate life without each other.
Gilmore? How about More-Gil (4.7)!
Lane faces her own separations in season four: from her mother and her boyfriend, Dave. Adam Brody left Gilmore Girls to play Seth on The O.C., and so his character goes to college in California and is rarely spoken of again. (The pain of Dave’s departure is somewhat numbed by the introduction of a new band member, Gil, played with wonderful earnestness by Sebastian Bach.)
Rami says, “I’m a fan of Assistant Pastor Eric” (4.11).
Fellow students who did not go on to be Oscar winners (4.11)
When she’s not covertly practicing with her band, Lane is attending a Mrs. Kim–approved Seventh Day Adventist college. In episode eleven, her study group must pick a leader to interview, and everyone but Lane suggests the school’s pastor or assistant pastor. Their clothing is as collective as their thoughts: They’re all dressed in conservative sweaters, slacks, and jumpers, in a color palette of burgundy, gray, brown, and cream. Only Lane stands apart in her ruffled dress: the cut still modest but the fabric rainbow striped, much like a sweater she’ll wear later in the episode.
Lane in 4.11
Gil gets the band a late-night gig at CBGB, and when Lane can’t come up with an alibi for her mother, she just . . . doesn’t. While a distressed Mrs. Kim waits for Lane to come home, she uncovers all the hiding places in her daughter’s room: filled with secular clothes, books, CDs, and makeup. For the first time, everything is literally out in the open, and Lane stands in front of her mother in an outfit she wouldn’t approve of, her hair still crimped from the gig.
The stripes on Lorelai’s sweater are a little thicker and less varied (1.17).
Presumably, Lane borrowed this outfit from Rory, whose dorm she spent the night in, but a version of this sweater actually appeared previously on Lorelai (1.17). At this moment, Lane is most like Lorelai, finally pushing back against her mother’s parenting, finally asking to live at home on her terms. Mrs. Kim refuses, and Lane moves out, leaving behind the clothes she hates.
Notice how both Kyon and Lane are wearing tan and pink (4.19)
Still, that doesn’t mean she wants someone else wearing them: In episode nineteen, Lane is incensed to see Mrs. Kim’s exchange student, Kyon, in her pink bunny sweater and “second-least-favorite scarf.” Lane thinks Kyon is “stealing” her old life: She even has glasses like Lane’s, black oval frames.
The skinny tie, so indie aughts it hurts (4.21)
Of course, Lane will “always be [Mrs. Kim’s] daughter,” no matter what she wears. In episode twenty-one, Mrs. Kim asks to visit Lane’s new apartment but is shocked to find her daughter living with two of her male bandmates. Zach and Brian have tried to have made themselves as presentable as they can, in button-downs and neckties; Lane has approximated her old modest outfits with a black dress and teal cardigan. She’s meeting Mrs. Kim halfway, but she’s not hiding anymore.
Favorite Line from Season Four
Every issue, I’m providing my favorite line(s) from that season. This one comes from drunk Luke, after Lorelai dresses his hand with Barbie Band-Aids. Scott Patterson’s delivery is everything.
Luke: Got a handful of Barbie!
I’m taking some time off at the end of this month, so season five will publish next month, on Thursday, October 20. Can’t wait to get into the latter half of the series with you, and in the most Gilmore time of year. Until then, feel free to like, comment on, and forward this post!
Essential Episodes for Season Five
5.7: “You Jump, I Jump, Jack”
5.8: “The Party’s Over”
5.13: “Wedding Bell Blues”
5.19: “But I’m a Gilmore!”
5.21: “Blame Booze and Melville”
