In its 18 original episodes through May 19, the series attracted an average of about 2.7 million viewers, according to Nielsen Media Research. But its clout as a cultural and shopping influence is amplified by the Web, including the show’s own site, which lets viewers identify the brand of the clothes and accessories in each episode and click through to buy them.
“We probably have 50 percent more of our traffic — close to 1 million viewers each month — going into Gossip Girl than into any other show,” said Travis Schneider, the founder of StarBrand Media, which handles the e-commerce connections for the series, along with other shows and films including She’s the Man and America’s Next Top Model.
Covet the top that the character Serena van der Woodsen wears in Episode 12? It’s made by Generra, available for US$68, according to the links from the CW Web site — or it was, before it and other items seen on the show sold out.
Daman, the costume designer, conducted his fashion research at private schools in Manhattan.
“I saw how edgy those girls were, how forward,” he said. “They wore their school uniforms a little shorter, a little tricked out, definitely tailored to fit them perfectly, and they took liberties through their tights and bags.”
The show’s devotees generally fall into two camps: those taken with the worldly nonchalance of Serena (Blake Lively), the show’s queen bee, and others fixated on the fussier style of Blair Waldorf (Leighton Meester), who is given to layering on brooches, pearls, scarves, a shrilly colorful blazer and patent leather pumps, topped with a frilly headband.
Rachel Grinney, the manager of Intermix in Washington, part of a chain of hip boutiques, said many of her young customers scour the store for variations on Serena’s haute bohemian mix of lithe leather jackets with loose-fitting T-shirts and knee-high boots.
Purists dismiss Blair’s look as visual clutter (“You don’t see headbands worn with brooches and necklaces,” scoffed one 16-year-old in the December issue of Teen Vogue), but admirers praise the show’s relative sophistication. “It represents a stylistic departure,” said Sari Sloane, the vice president for fashion merchandising of the 24-store Intermix chain, “a move away from a Hollywood look that was very causal and improvised, to something more polished, more big-city chic.”
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