Prime VideoYou simply cannot make an Elle Woods TV show without going all-in on the most eye-catching pink fashions. But for costume designers Sophie De Rakoff and Sara Byblow, the most meaningful connection between 2001’s Legally Blonde and Prime Video’s Elle prequel series is a couture accessory that even hardcore fans might not notice right away.That’s because it’s not even part of Elle’s wardrobe in the show.The stylists tell Elite Daily that they gave Elle’s mother, Eva, an important item from the movie as a “storytelling Easter egg” to flesh out the Woods family lore through the language of fashion.While Byblow emphasized that the costuming team “did not want to remake and match” Elle’s looks in Legally Blonde, she pointed out that an understated movie prop actually does reappear in Elle — and it isn’t in the character’s signature pink shade.“One piece that Sophie and I put a lot of thought into is the red Bottega bag,” Byblow says. “Elle Woods wears it in the movies, but it didn’t make sense for us storywise to just say ‘She has a red Bottega bag here, so we’ll give her a red Bottega bag in the show.’ It was more so about how did that come to be?”In Legally Blonde, Elle carries a cherry-red, woven-leather Bottega Veneta handbag in various scenes. It’s most notably featured when Elle first arrives at Harvard Law School, as she totes it around campus to her introductory classes and during her meme-worthy run-in with her ex-boyfriend Warner.MGMInstead of giving 16-year-old Elle the same designer bag, Byblow and De Rakoff thought it would be more meaningful to have her mother carry it.“We decided to put it on Eva in the pilot,” Byblow says. “It’s someone that she looks up to, and that bag is something that would’ve been passed down. We were very much so trying to work backwards and build the story of how Elle became this person, versus trying to just recreate the person that she was.”De Rakoff, who famously served as the sole costume designer for the OG Legally Blonde, liked how moving Elle’s favorite accessory to her mom added a deeper layer of connection between the pair. “It’s fashion, but it’s all about character, and it’s a storytelling Easter egg within this world,” she says. “There are others, but that’s my favorite because it tells a mother-daughter story.”While Eva’s bag is not prominently featured in Elle’s first episode, it can be seen in her seat in the car as the Woods family departs from Los Angeles.Prime VideoBoth costume designers were drawn to how Elle and Eva use fashion to bolster their strong connection, a bond that wasn’t shown at all in Legally Blonde.“They are both inspired by each other,” Byblow says. “When Elle’s a fish out of water in Seattle, her mom is this safe space for her. She is the closest thing aesthetically to what she’s used to in L.A. They both stand out in this new world, and I think there’s something really special in how Elle looks to her mother and sees her standing her ground.”
‘Elle’s Costume Designers On The ‘Legally Blonde’ Red Bag Easter Egg
