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Of all the Sex and the City women, Charlotte York’s aesthetic is perhaps the most sacred. No one wants to admit they’re fully a Charlotte, but everyone wishes they had her clothes. Amid her adventurous friend group in the original series, Charlotte was the conservative traditionalist: old-fashioned and often out of touch, but endearingly committed to romance. Her posh, preppy wardrobe, filled with buttery cashmere turtlenecks and A-line sweetheart dresses, was peak Park Avenue aspiration. But in And Just Like That, the once impeccably-dressed Charlotte York has dissolved into someone unrecognizable. Since the spinoff first hit screens in 2021, fans have been asking what happened to this character’s outfits. Now living her dream as a married and moneyed Manhattanite, one would expect to see a fully realized version of Charlotte York in endless Ralph Lauren slip skirts and The Row cardigans. But nay. For some reason, And Just Like That has sentenced our quiet-luxury queen to a closet full of distracting patterns, over-embellished sleeves and loud statement belts. For an art dealer that once epitomized streamlined ’90s chic, her outfits now feel forced.
Photography courtesy of HBO
To be fair, Charlotte York is facing a new set of challenges. And Just Like That Season 3 finds her having re-entered her career at a gallery while caring for her cancer-diagnosed husband. On top of it all, she must also deal with her objectively terrible children, whose meanness is routinely played for laughs. Watching her daughter berate her for not making reservations at Nobu or call her “gross” when she comes home from a night out with friends feels not only depressing but aesthetically incorrect. This is a woman obsessed with decorum and manners, who famously told her ex-husband Trey’s mother she was “worth a million dollars” when negotiating her prenup. She was someone who put her foot down; she wouldn’t tolerate back-talk. And yet, these days, her priorities seem out of whack. She’ll pile on dizzying Burberry checks and pair a tweed skirt with a Lilly-Pulitzer-esque top, but she won’t check her children for being disrespectful.
Photography courtesy of HBO
Of course, old Charlotte had her faults. She was judgmental about her friends’ sexual experiences and obsessed with class status. But she also had a singular softness: she was vulnerable, loyal, and even when heartbroken, never afraid to lead with her emotions. Her complexity came through in her playful style moments. Back then, she wore frills, pink furs and, yes, statement belts. But even in her most experimental outfits, she always looked real; her clothes were lived in. These days, she appears to be cosplaying a Charlotte-York caricature. Perhaps the most obvious example of her altered essence is her reaction to her friend Lisa Todd Wexley’s emotional infidelity in episode 8. When Lisa admits to having an unspoken romantic “energy” with her hot (and married) co-worker, Charlotte pauses, looks up to the sky to deliberate, and delivers breezily: “Well… isn’t that what you want when you’re working with someone creatively? Like, a connection!” It’s unclear whether Charlotte—standing on the sidewalk in a severely thick belt—believes her own hypothesis. Instead, you get the sense that she’s humouring her friend to protect her feelings. Sex and the City Charlotte York, whose entire personality revolved around the sanctity of marriage, would never.
Photography courtesy of HBO
Later that episode, we get close to an old-Charlotte outfit. At her gallery exhibition, she wears a lovely open-back column dress. It’s a nostalgically polished look, but it doesn’t last long, because Charlotte is struck with a wave of vertigo and falls onto an art installation of fake semen. This cartoonish mishap embodies the contrived air of her character today. While SATC Charlotte was often theatrically shocked by her friends, these days she’s cartoonishly enthusiastic about almost everything. It leaves you to wonder whether AJLT Charlotte, in all her sculptural silhouettes and bouffant-style hairdos, is even real.
Photography courtesy of HBO
After all, as TikTok sleuths have pointed out, Charlotte’s birthday is canonically in January. And yet, in season 3 of And Just Like That, it’s suspiciously set in the summer. An entire episode is dedicated to giving Charlotte York a karaoke-filled fête on a balmy New York City evening—a plot hole almost as garish as her colour-clashing. It begs the question: Is this Charlotte an identical interloper with a hidden agenda to over-emote and distract us with her sleeves? I’m not unconvinced. Continue Reading
