The White Lotus’s third season in Thailand turns resort wear into a sly extension of character. Luxury looks here aren’t about subtlety or “quiet” wealth—they’re loud, clashing, and laden with clues. “We don’t do quiet luxury,” costume designer Alex Bovaird proclaimed to Vogue of the audacious designer wardrobes sported by these badly behaving guests. It’s a heightened paradise where one wears Valentino to the pool and Cartier to breakfast. Every outfit – from a billowing caftan to a sequined mini – reveals its wearer’s ego, desires, and delusions. Below, we decode the season’s standout costumes and the stories they choose to tell.
Aimee Lou Wood’s Chelsea floats through the White Lotus in beachy, bohemian ensembles that make laissez-faire look luxe. In one scene she’s lounging in a vintage crocheted dress over a bikini, radiating a carefree ’60s Bardot-meets-’90s Kate Moss vibe. Her style is all mix-and-match crochet, funky knitwear and flea-market jewelry – decidedly not the head-to-toe designer uniform of her fellow guests. This wardrobe speaks to Chelsea’s free-spirited, open-book persona: she’s the only one not hiding an agenda, a “relatable and accessible” presence amid the posh chaos, as Bovaird puts it.
By eschewing high fashion for DIY charm (Bovaird’s team literally chopped thrifted dresses into beach cover-ups), Chelsea becomes the show’s style hero. Tellingly, fans would rather dress like this blissed-out backpacker than any billionaire – her wanderlust crochet and tie-dye pieces spark weekly social media envy and Coachella inspiration. “She doesn’t wear too much high fashion… she is a flea market girl, but with some aspirational pieces,” Bovaird notes in an interview with InStyle, pointing to Chelsea’s beloved 18k gold dog-tag necklace as her lone indulgence. In a hotel full of Valentino-clad phonies, Chelsea’s down-to-earth look underlines her role as the sincere heart in a den of cynics.
Three lifelong friends—Jaclyn, Laurie, and Kate—arrive for a girls’ getaway dressed as if for a Bravo-meets-Goop wellness retreat, all matching designer sundresses and competitive streaks. One dinner, for example, finds Jaclyn shimmering in a tight Valentino sequin mini, Laurie sleek in an electric-blue slip, and Kate swanning about in a metallic caftan that billows dramatically as she moves. Visually, they’re a coordinated wall of status symbols (think Sex and the City goes to Southeast Asia), yet each outfit carries an undercurrent of one-upmanship.
Decades of simmering resentments and alpha posturing are woven into their wardrobe choices. “They have the same closets, different font,” Bovaird jokes to InStyle – the trio was initially outfitted “as one cohesive blob” to show their shared vanity, before tweaking looks to reflect individual pecking order. The result? Jaclyn is the peacock leading the pack, while her two pals dress to keep up. “They were sort of my Sex and the City ladies,” Bovaird explains, noting how these “slightly toxic” besties are essentially “dressing for each other”. Whether they’re toting identical Hermès bags at breakfast or showing skin at the spa in designer activewear, their collective style screams privilege, intimacy, and rivalry all at once – a pastel-armored clique ready to either hug or tear each other apart, depending on the drama of the day.
Chloe (Charlotte Le Bon) – a French-Canadian ex-model marooned in paradise – turns every outing into a personal fashion shoot. Greeting guests on her boyfriend’s superyacht, she dons a bubblegum-pink Jacquemus one-piece swimsuit with a gauzy sarong and a wide-brimmed sun hat, as if welcoming us to the lifestyle of the rich and shameless. It’s a show-stopping ensemble custom-made for the character (Simon Porte Jacquemus himself volunteered to create it for Bovaird), underscoring Chloe’s role as Season 3’s resident trendsetter.
The sugary color and playful French design belie a shrewd self-awareness: Chloe knows the power of a good outfit. By day she plays the carefree, bronzed yacht girl – but that polished look also hints at ulterior motives. (After all, she’s enjoying this yacht courtesy of a sketchy financier’s “shady money,” and her picture-perfect swimwear suggests she might be in on his scheme.) In true White Lotus fashion, her luxurious resort wear works on two levels: it contributes to the escapist, sun-drenched mood while planting seeds of suspicion that beauty may be a mask for complicity. Either way, Chloe’s yacht couture nails the current jet-set influencer trend and firmly establishes her as the show’s sartorial siren, luring others into dangerous waters.
When the sun goes down, Chloe cranks up the drama with outfits that blur the line between resort and runway. Case in point: for an island party she slips into a wildly whimsical combination – a polka-dot bodysuit paired with a striped, sequined sarong-skirt tied at the waist. This daring custom look (another Jacquemus creation made just for her) clashes patterns and textures with high-fashion glee, and Chloe carries it off with the nonchalance of someone who’s spent years in front of cameras. The visual cacophony – sparkles, dots, and stripes – feels extra in the best way, echoing the season’s maximalist “loud luxury” ethos. It also mirrors Chloe’s own chaotic entanglements: she’s juggling secret liaisons and opportunistic plans, and her clothes revel in that risky excess.
Bovaird has noted that The White Lotus occupies a “cool” niche where viewers actually covet the characters’ style, and Chloe’s wardrobe is proof – every item she wears, from a rare Hunza G bikini to this avant-garde evening look, sparked real-world shopping frenzies. In-story, the outfit cements Chloe’s persona as the life of the party with perhaps a few tricks up her designer sleeves. She’s dressed to dazzle and distract, contributing to the show’s hedonistic mood while subtly reminding us that in this world, fashion is often a smokescreen. Chloe’s fearless print-mixing is not just a style statement but a narrative one: nothing about her is simple or subdued, and that keeps everyone guessing.
Southern matriarch Victoria Ratliff (Parker Posey) and her husband Timothy (Jason Isaacs) exemplify a couture version of culture shock. She arrives in Thailand dressed as if for a Carolina country club luncheon – clutching a white Gucci top-handle bag, primly tying a silk scarf over her shoulders, and buttoned into a preppy shirtdress. He sticks to his genteel uniform of linen and loafers. Even under the tropical sun, Victoria refuses to loosen up: instead, she breaks out a trove of loud Lilly Pulitzer–esque dresses and vintage caftans for the resort, complete with a constant haze of disdain. (Her philosophy: why assimilate when you can accessorize?)
Bovaird told Vogue that her inspiration for the Ratliffs was imagining they “stepped out of a Ralph Lauren catalog”, and indeed the couple’s wardrobe is an arch parody of WASPy American wealth transplanted abroad. The two even sport matching gold Rolex Day-Date watches – his with a black face, hers encrusted with diamonds – a his-and-hers power move that silently declares their united front. Those ostentatious timepieces hint at plot, too: despite marital tensions (he’s secretly facing embezzlement charges, she’s popping lorazepam from a monogrammed Louis Vuitton pill case), their fates are “forever intertwined” just like their synchronized accessories. Victoria’s brightly colored caftans and Timothy’s impeccable vacation blazers also set a tonal contrast in the show’s palette, reinforcing the theme that this family is literally and figuratively out of their element. In true Posey fashion, Victoria’s look has become an Instagram sensation off-screen – fans bombarded Bovaird for details on those eccentric sunglasses (custom-made, naturally). The Ratliffs’ style, equal parts Southern charm and tone-deaf opulence, contributes to the show’s satirical take on privilege: they’re dressed to ignore their surroundings, and in doing so, reveal exactly who they are.
Leslie Bibb’s Kate is the picture of Texas old money trying to reboot herself under the Thai sun. Every piece Kate wears screams polished wealth – Cartier bracelets, bespoke sandals, the right designer tote – yet there’s a hint of second-place syndrome in her choices. She’s forever styled just a beat behind her more famous friend Jaclyn, as if following a how-to guide for glamorous vacation attire. (Indeed, Bovaird notes to InStyle that Jaclyn’s pals were costumed as “just trying to keep up” with the actress’s It-Girl fashion drops.)
For all its expense, Kate’s wardrobe cleverly reflects her character: confident but not original, luxurious but a tad try-hard. Still, her fashion sense adds to the White Lotus’s decadent atmosphere – she’s the one wafting through the lobby in a silken cover-up and oversized shades, completing the show’s gallery of privileged peacocks. While Kate’s style may not break new ground, it nails the quietly loud trends of the moment: think status swimwear, metallic resort-wear, and the cultivated nonchalance of a woman who absolutely made sure her outfit matched the hotel’s decor. In the grand tableau of White Lotus excess, Kate is the satellite orbiting Jaclyn’s sun – impeccably dressed and utterly aware of appearances.
As a fading Hollywood star determined to shine one last time, Jaclyn (Michelle Monaghan) treats the resort as her personal red carpet. She refuses to dial it down for the tropics – you’ll find her strutting to the pool in a leopard-print Valentino bathing suit with a matching silk cover-up and designer tote in hand, or commanding the dinner table in a slinky sequined mini that shimmers like an Oscar statuette. Bovaird told InStyle she imagined this character might receive “a big box of goodies from Valentino” or a Hermès handbag gratis – perks of being an It-Girl actress – and Jaclyn certainly dresses the part. She coordinates head-to-toe outfits with an old-school movie star flair (a scarf to match the swimwear, jewels to match the gown), projecting confidence even as she quietly panics about aging out of relevance. In her friendship group, Jaclyn’s couture wardrobe is both her armor and her ace up the sleeve: it’s how she keeps the upper hand over Kate and Laurie, who show up in simpler frocks while she’s dripping in Valentino.
The inspiration for Jaclyn’s look came from a real style icon. “She was a big influence on how I put Jaclyn together,” Bovaird tells InStyle of muse Sienna Miller. “Amazingly cool and bohemian, a little bit rock and roll… stylish, and old movie star”– that sums up Jaclyn’s vibe perfectly. Indeed, there’s a whiff of Talitha Getty meets Studio 54 in her choices: glamorous caftans by day, barely-there designer dresses by night, all worn with performative ease. Even in the absurd, cutthroat world of The White Lotus, she’s dressing like she’s the main character (because in her mind, she is).
The Ratliff offspring – Saxon (Patrick Schwarzenegger), Piper (Sarah Catherine Hook), and Lochlan (Sam Nivola) – embody a generational clash written into their clothes. Eldest son Saxon strides into the resort as the avatar of entitled bro culture: pastel Southern Tide polos or flashy all-black designer tees, Brooks Brothers shorts a tad too short, and a $23,000 Hublot watch on his wrist. He looks like he was dressed by his father’s banker. (Later, tellingly, he swaps the gaudy Hublot for one of his dad’s more refined Rolexes – a small costume change that signals Saxon’s attempt to step out of his father’s shadow and appear more grown-up.)
Piper, the middle child, starts out as a picture-perfect Southern debutante abroad, wafting around in a white lace Ralph Lauren sundress and delicate gold jewelry. But as her restless character seeks spiritual meaning in Thailand, her style subtly shifts from buttoned-up to bohemian. “She’s looking for something more meaningful than her very materialistic family,” Bovaird says of Piper to Vogue, describing how they made her wardrobe “a bit more earthy… really wholesome, and a little more covered up”. Then there’s
Lochlan, the youngest, who arrives seemingly the most grounded – rocking in one of his scenes a cheeky graphic tee that literally says “Talk to Me About a Reality Check” and an ironic MoonSwatch on his arm. But as the island’s temptations pull him in, his style careens to extremes. In the season’s most jaw-dropping scene, Lochlan sheds a kitschy Tombolo shirt covered in cartoon gators – aptly named “Reptile Dysfunction” – right before making an unforgivable mistake with his sibling. Through these sartorial cues, the Ratliff kids’ looks contribute to the show’s tension and dark humor. Their preppy vacation attire initially paints a portrait of privileged, well-behaved youth, only for those clothes to become absurdly incongruent with their scandalous behavior.
