To all the boys, always and forever

It’s the final year of the graduating class of 2021 at fictional Adler High School, and Lara Jean Song Covey has her eyes set on the future – a future she hopes to share with her boyfriend, Peter Kavinsky.

In the final installment of the “To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before” trilogy – based on Jenny Han’s bestselling novels of the same name – Lara Jean (Lana Condor) prepares for the end of high school and the start of adulthood. But after two life-changing trips, Lara Jean must reinvent life with family, friends and boyfriend Peter Kavinsky (Noah Centineo) after graduation. As everything changes around her, she continues to find solace in this place that is a reflection of herself – her childhood bedroom.

Over the course of the series, Lara Jean’s bedroom becomes a focal point to show the evolution of her character. It’s the place where she ultimately transforms from wide-eyed book reader and love letter writer to an empowered young woman, determined to pursue the future she has always dreamed of.

Netflix set designer Chris August “To All the Boys: Always and Forever” – who also worked on the second film – spoke exclusively with Apartment Therapy about the importance of Lara Jean’s bedroom. Plus, we got a glimpse of the biggest changes to other rooms in the Covey House and the unique opportunity to use Seoul decor infused with Korean art and architecture.

Apartment Therapy: Where did you find your inspiration when designing Lara Jean’s bedroom?

Chris August: Looking back, [director Michael Fimognari and I] have always had an affinity for classic movies, and Jenny Han even made it part of her story. So a lot of it comes from iconic movie scenes, [such as] “Say Anything,” where there’s this scene of an actor standing with a boombox above his head in a long coat of rain. We made reference to “The Big Lebowski” in the movie, and you’ll find some really interesting references that we tried to fit into his bedroom as well. Those are [the] stories we see in the movies we carry with us. Lara Jean is the same.

AT: How has Lara Jean’s bedroom changed since the first and second films?

THIS: The original bedroom design was great in that it really captured the character of the room. So kudos to Paul Joyal, who originally designed it, and Bobbi Allyn, who decorated it. It was really nice for us when we took over. We basically added it, gave it a kind of memory garden. We took all the memories we could collect in the book [and recreate] graphically and place them on the wall. These are parts of his life, this is what a teenage room can become [as] it shows the stages of a person’s life.

As we enter this third film, [Lara Jean] is a senior now, so we kept the basic details and just added more specific details about her time in school and what she was expecting for the future in terms of the university where she was. could go and what she might be interested in.

AT: What details of Lara Jean’s bedroom have remained consistent throughout the trilogy?

THIS: For the most part, the bones have remained the same. We have added things that she gathered along the way in her life story and added them. As she progresses, she becomes interested in writing and she has always been an avid reader so we added a few things of these and always made sure we kept up to date. of his life.

AT: How would you describe the style of Lara Jean’s bedroom?

THIS: It’s very eclectic. Lots of sound art and sound works, it’s kind of a suburban thrift store. The resurgence of the 60s, 70s and even 80s has happened over the years. We brought a lot of them to her room with colors and objects because, like all styles, they are cyclical. They’re coming in increasingly faster cycles, so that’s what we were looking for. Throughout the rest of the movie, too, we used these same themes to create a retro future. [design], therefore, to say.

AT: What about the other rooms in the Covey house? What has stayed the same over the years and what has changed?

THIS: Trina (Sarayu Rao) is part of the family (and becomes Lara Jean’s stepmother). [Lara Jean’s] mom was a mainstay of the family so adding a stepmom to the movie and her life was a big change. There has been a very surprising change for [Lara Jean] in that the house is redesigned on the level of furniture, and the stamp of Trina enters the house. We did it in a way that respected her mom and what her mom had done, and brought the two together (Lara Jean’s late mom and her new stepmom’s styles). We spent some time updating it with new furnishings and brighter colors.

AT: What sort of colors did you really want to bring out in this movie to signify the huge change in all of their lives?

THIS: Yellow. Even though Trina comes in and changes the status quo, we did it with light and color and basically the sun. She brings a lot more sunshine in the life of Dan (Lara Jean’s father) and in the lives of the girls. Even during the pandemic, you see it popping up everywhere. There is a luminosity that people try to add in their life because they lack a bit of it. They miss a bit from the outside, so we bring it.

AT: You shot the last two films pretty much back to back. Do you have a favorite part of the Covey house from the last two movies?

THIS: One element I really liked about “To All the Boys: PS I Still Love You” was the treehouse, [which] was a lovely element. In “To all the boys: always and forever”, [I enjoyed] enhancing the colors and bringing brightness to the house. We have created a wallpaper room that [belonged to] Lara Jean’s mom, and we changed that for Trina, so it was a big change. You will see in the movie that there is a special moment dedicated to this, which brings Lara Jean to a place that is somewhat reminiscent with her mother and her life with her mother which turns into Trina’s life, which is really friendly.

AT: You were also able to film a bit of the film in Seoul. Tell us a bit about Lara Jean’s hotel room.

THIS: It was a lovely room, and we chose it because it was truly Korean design in the sense of its relationship to the woods. We changed the art in the hotel room, and added even more of a Korean theme. I actually went to take a bunch of photographs inside and outside of some of the local temples and created black and white artwork, referencing the 60s and using it as an element. design in the hotel room. We brought in some magenta, just to keep our characters in their comfortable palette.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.