Euphoria Costume Designer Heidi Bivens Says Zendaya Kept “A Bunch Of Rue Stuff”

Heidi Bivens, Euphoria’s costume designer, has seen the “Euphoria High” TikToks. But the cultural impact of the show’s fashion — which she painstakingly curated — reached far beyond the memes on your FYP.

Fans of the HBO Max drama relentlessly recreated the characters’ ensembles (and makeup), causing the styles worn on-screen to sell out and putting labels like I.AM.GIA and Eckhaus Latta on the map. But beyond copying viral ‘fits, it’s the philosophy of dressing as one’s truest self that really struck a chord with Gen Z. And that’s all thanks to Bivens’ attention to detail and undeniable aptitude for communicating a narrative through characters’ clothing.

“For me, clothes as a medium have to do with telling stories. That’s where my interest lies,” the costume designer told Bustle. It’s for that reason you won’t see her styling stars for red carpets — Bivens would rather collaborate with a cast to build wardrobes that feel authentic to their on-screen alter egos.

Bivens writes in her book Euphoria Fashion that Alexa Demie created mood boards for Maddy’s style, while Zendaya asked Bevins to incorporate her late grandfather’s jacket, and Hunter Schafer “would send ideas all the time,” Bevins said.

The cast got so involved, in fact, that by Season 2 Bivens had to “keep strict rules” about which brands each character was allowed to wear. “A lot of the female cast would send me similar ideas. They’d want to wear the same designers, because that was what was cool at the moment,” she recalls.

In the upcoming season, Bivens will be relinquishing the costuming and taking up a new position as a producer of the show — but not before spilling insider details from behind the scenes. Ahead, Bivens talks her new book, what items Zendaya kept from the closet, and her favorite character to dress.

Who do you think is the show’s most stylish character?

Jules is my fave because she wasn’t really modeled after any person who existed before her character. For example, Kat, Barbie Ferreira’s character, was very much influenced by the character Enid from Ghost World. Lexi was very much inspired by a friend of mine. So [for] each character, there was someone I looked to in the real world who was inspiring to me. But Jules was more like anime, not a real person, so there was more opportunity to do something that was more original than some of the other characters.

Among the cast, whose real-life style do you appreciate the most?

I love Maude [Apatow’s] red carpet style. She looks so chic, and what she does with her hair and makeup, really appeals to me. I mean, Z’s got great style. And Hunter has unbelievable style. Barbie does too. It's a really hard choice because they all have great style. Alexa is phenomenal. But Maude’s is probably the closest to what I would wear.

And then day-to-day style, I think Jacob [Elordi] has cool street style. He dips into fashion and he’s not always completely heteronormative, which is interesting.

A lot of the looks in both seasons went viral on TikTok. Were there any that surprised you?

Even though it’s a funny scene, I was surprised by how viral the Cassie/Maddy lookalike looks went. And there was that meme of Maddy with her little bag, and someone was like, “You can’t even fit pencils in there,” or something.

The cast seemed very involved in their characters’ wardrobes — in your book, you mention Alexa Demie even had mood boards. Who would you say was the most involved?

Probably Alexa, because we even went fabric-swatching together. So sometimes if I was slammed, rather than sending someone from my team, I’d send her down the street to a place called ISW, International Silks & Woolens. She would know exactly what she’d want.

She would make an amazing fashion designer. She has other ambitions, but she has such a keen eye and really knows how to take inspiration from what has come before and create her own version of it. And so she was definitely a really exciting partner to have in creating Maddy.

You also include Jacob Elordi’s handwritten request to limit skinny jeans in the book. Are there other items you steered clear of?

I have rules for each character. Fezco doesn’t wear V-necks. Rue doesn’t wear skirts or dresses. So there’s these rules that I make up for each character, just like we do for ourselves.

That [note] was just a funny thing because I had already announced to my department that I didn’t want any skinny jeans on the characters for [the] second season. And somehow, a pair snuck in and were put in his room. So my costume [department] sent me the image of the wire hanger that he wrote on and it just cracked me up.

Did any star keep an item they wore on screen?

Zendaya has a bunch of Rue stuff. She is sentimental in that way and also smart as an actor to have at least a few items for each character you’ve played. Some actors even have it written into their contracts. At the end of Season 1, and definitely Season 2, she came by the wardrobe office, where we have all the closets [of] the characters, and pulled whatever she wanted to take with her.

I read Hunter sewed the star choker that she wore in an episode. Did you DIY other pieces for the show?

[During] the intervention for Rue that happens at Cassie and Lexi’s house, the sweatshirt that Cassie's wearing is something I built. It’s a corseted cropped sweatshirt, and it’s a seemingly ordinary piece, but I was looking for [one] everywhere and I couldn't find exactly what I was looking for. We built a lot for the show.

What scene was the most difficult to style?

The whole play was so much fun, but it was tricky because we had to ask a lot of questions just to make sure we knew whose mind we [were] in [and] whose reality. And to keep all that straight because we were weaving in and out of dream, flashback, reality, and the reality [that] was within a reality on a stage.

Did you harken back to your own high school style to dress the teenage characters?

There’s elements of me in a lot of the characters. So many of us love to try different kinds of looks, especially at that age. I definitely went through a stage where I was wearing baggy clothes in the ‘90s and my look was very similar to Rue’s. Rue is often communicating her mental state to the audience through the way she’s dressed. That to me represented an era of style that was very popular coming out of the rave and skate [cultures].

[In the] second season, there’s a lot of Lexi pieces that I think would’ve been in my closet over the years. There's probably a little bit of my personal style in all the characters.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.