Hamish Bowles: At a time when shows featuring friends trying to make it in Manhattan were as ubiquitous as television itself, one series stood out by opening up its closests to the world. 

Editor: Well in that case, have you ever heard of the Vogue accessories closet?

Carrie Bradshaw: Oh my god. It's too good. I'm sorry but it's too good. 

Editor: Just like a kid in a couture candy store. 

Hamish Bowles: In the 2000s "Sex and the City" became a must-watch series featuring must have fashion. The romantic comedy drama revolved around the effusive Carrie Bradshaw, who's city girl charm, accessorized by her obsession with fashion proved to viewers across the world that the woman wears the clothes and not the other way around. "Sex and the City" quickly became a cultural touchstone that brought seventh avenue fashion to the masses. 

Carrie Bradshaw: You know when I first moved to New York and I was totally broke? Sometimes I would buy Vogue instead of dinner, I just felt it fed me more. The fact is sometimes it's hard to walk in a single woman's shoes. That's why we need really special ones now and then to make the walk a little more fun. 

Hamish Bowles: It was intimate, like reading someone's diary. It was instrumental in ushering fashion into the mainstream zeitgeist, and the style was all choreographed by Sarah Jessica Parker and costume designer, Patricia Field.

Welcome to In Vogue: the 2000s, a podcast about the decade that push it in a new millennium and redefined boundaries in fashion and society. Alongside fashion leaders, cultural icons and Vogue's editorial team, we'll dissect the decades most impactful style moments and how they've shaped our culture today.

Anna Wintour: I'm Anna Wintour. 

Hamish Bowles: And I'm your host Hamish Bowles.

Although considered a fashion trailblazer today, when "Sex and the City" first came on the air the design team struggled to fill its wardrobe racks with designer brands. Here's "Sex and the City" costume designer, Pat Field. 

Patricia Field: At the beginning, nobody ever heard of it. And you know, I would call, I'm not going to mention any names and I would leave a message, I would never get a call back. 

Sarah Jessica Parker: We couldn't get anybody to loan us anything. 

Hamish Bowles: This is the unmistakable voice of Emmy winning actress, Sarah Jessica Parker, who of course starred in "Sex and the City" as Carrie Bradshaw. 

Sarah Jessica Parker: And we had a very, very small budget relative to the show. I'm not going to tell you the number except to say it's much lower than you would guess. And we were just pulling from consignment shops. Any old vintage warehouses in Miami and Pittsburgh and up and down the Eastern seaboard. We couldn't get anybody to loan us a shoe, a bag, a coat. 

Hamish Bowles: With a modest debut in the summer of 1998, finding the right creative talent was instrumental in furthering the show's success. 

Sarah Jessica Parker: We actually had a different costume designer for the pilot. And when we started as a television series, we sat down to re-imagine the crew most especially on the artistic side, so production designer, DPs, costume designer- Pat's name came up. 

Hamish Bowles: The secret weapon for securing authentic fashion pieces and for overseeing the curation of each characters looks on the show was costume designer and stylist Patricia Field.

She experienced the downtown New York club scene of the late seventies and eighties. The era of Mud Club, Area, Danceteria and Palladium. She retailed clothing to club kids so she had a deep understanding of what one should wear to get behind the velvet ropes and onto the dance floor in a party mood. She was an extraordinary asset for the show and shaped its visual look.

Patricia Field: I had worked with Sarah Jessica Parker in Miami on a feature film directed by David Frankel. And that was our first experience together. 

Sarah Jessica Parker: We had done a movie called "Miami Rhapsody" and Pat Field was the costume designer for "Miami Rhapsody." "Miami Rhapsody" was not a movie about fashion it was about people so she can do both. But we wanted her for her eye for her uniquely New York eye, for the eye that had played such an important role in fashion. So we wanted Pat because we knew that we wanted the clothes to help tell a story. 

Patricia Field: So Sarah Jessica said, let me introduce me to Darren Star. And so she did, and that's how the whole thing started. 

Sarah Jessica Parker: Pat is extraordinary. I think one of her great strengths is she's almost an historian. You know, she has just a huge amount of information in her head and points of reference that seem immaterial, but are always interesting and often create some of the most vividly memorable looks. 

Hamish Bowles: Because Pat had grown up in the fashion trenches of the edgiest clubs, she knew how to create looks that anticipated and perpetuated trends. Bold pieces made sense for Carrie Bradshaw, an achingly hip girl of the moment who was a writer involved in contemporary media, living for fashion and incredibly knowledgeable about designer brands. Sarah Jessica worked closely with Pat to develop her characters style. 

Sarah Jessica Parker: What happened very quickly on "Sex and the City" was a partnership. I mean, a true collaboration. I was very suited to be her paper doll. 

Patricia Field: Sarah Jessica Parker, and I say it without reservation, she got fashion and she wasn't afraid to try something a little quirky. We tangled together, so to speak. And that was really good because it produced that whole wardrobe of hers, which people loved. And it was quirky, but she got it. She, she could handle it. And it worked. You can't make it work and either works or it doesn't. 

Hamish Bowles: "Sex and the City's" leading star and one of the industry's most refined fashion eyes, draped to show about four intelligent women navigating work, relationships, and life in New York and the most iconic styles of the decade. Here's Vogue's former Creative Director, Sally Singer. 

Sally Singer: There's more women in "Sex and the City", but there's really three storylines. Who they loved, how they loved each other, and what they wore in the process. 

Cynthia Nixon: They're looking for love, but not necessarily marriage. 

Hamish Bowles: This is none other than activist and Emmy award-winning actress, Cynthia Nixon, who of course played Miranda Hobs in "Sex and the City." 

Cynthia Nixon: They're looking for great sex and they're looking for a big connection with the man, which for different ones of them means different things. But I think it's for women who have careers and very active love lives and are looking to connect with men on the same kind of deep level with which they connect with each other. 

Laird Borelli-Persson: I think that show is extremely powerful.

Hamish Bowles: This is Laird Borelli-Persson, Vogue's Archive Editor. 

Laird Borelli-Persson: It wasn't "Seinfeld," but it was nice because every, like if "Seinfeld" episode was an episode about nothing, but nothing specifically, like not returning a library book. Carrie's was like something about like, not getting returned call or being on a date and forgetting a prophylactic or something. Do you know what I mean? Not absurdist as "Seinfeld," but they were like things that actually happen to regular people only in a much more glamorous and expensive setting. 

Hamish Bowles: The transformative power of fashion was on full display in "Sex and the City." With each member of the tight-knit circle of friends expressing her own individuality through her clothes. Samantha dressed primarily for sexual allure, whereas Charlotte had a more classic and conservative approach to self presentation. Miranda was practical in her wardrobe choices, as for her fashion was more about function than form. Carrie, the linchpin for the group, was exploratory and inventive and has style and not confined to an archetype. Their differences allowed for ample room for pat field and Darren Star, creator of the series to play. 

Patricia Field: I asked Darren, "You have four gals here. Give me a description of the way you see each gal." And he did. Kim was the sexy one. Charlotte was the gal that you want to take home to mother, but when it came to Sarah Jessica, Darren said to me, "Eclectic ."

Virginia Smith: When you look back and, and I actually was looking back not too long ago, to look at some of Carrie Bradshaw's greatest hits. It was very much this eclectic mix of vintage-y inspired pieces or vintage mixed with designer pieces. 

Hamish Bowles: This is Vogue editor, Virginia Smith. 

Virginia Smith: She was the epitome of high and low. And I think that's one of the things that made people think that fashion was more accessible. She showed them you could wear a Dior dress, but you can pair it with a vintage shoe and a cardigan from the GAP and it all works. And she was remarkable at that. And I think people, especially young girls looked at that and said, "I could do that too." I can look in my closet and figure out a way to sort of replicate that no matter what the price point or what the designer was. So she sort of empowered this new way of dressing, which was pretty fabulous. 

Hamish Bowles: Here's Vogue's Archive editor, Laird Borelli-Persson. 

Laird Borelli-Persson: In the 2000s, this concept of high, low dressing, so mixing something that you already had with something like an "it bag" or mixing Zara pants with I don't know if Chanel jacket, started to become in Vogue and what we know as high street fashion. The Zara's and H&M's of the world really started to become popular. So popular that high fashion brands did collaborations with them. So you had Stella McCartney and H&M, you had a whole list. So this desire for fashion that started being stoked in the nineties by the glamour of Versace shows, the availability of fashion TV and, and above all, probably MTV. Then in the 2000s super, super exploded because of the connection with celebrity. Through film and the more democratic television and that desire was met by the creation of more accessible copies or iterations of luxury goods that were less accessible to most people. 

Hamish Bowles: Carrie was an inspiration for those interested in creating statement looks that mixed in high street fashion brands, alongside aspirational luxury pieces. Sarah Jessica Parker was intentional in expressing her character's eclectic style. 

Sarah Jessica Parker: She talked a lot about this kind of fevered relationship she had with shoes and with fashion. Of course, as the years went by, we sort of, we tossed away the idea of reality paying a role just sometimes for our own just absolute delight. But I think it very much helped you understand who she was and also why she felt like an outsider. Why she didn't fit in conventional style or fashion. I think even the way she felt about Big and not being appropriate, right? Or the kind of girl that he would eventually marry, had to do a lot with kind of her outside world of fashion. You know, she loved vintage and I think that helped tell you a lot about her. She loved to be herself. To walk out the door feeling much more like herself than somebody that she recognized in a magazine. I think she was inspired completely by imagery and beautiful work and decadence and the unreachable. But I think she tried to find her own version of that, that made her feel as good as looking through the pages of, you know, the September issue or the March issue. But that wasn't a reality for her always. And I think there was a deep desire to be herself for better or worse, frankly. 

Hamish Bowles: Carrie's compelling and irresistible persona entertained and illumined audiences and made her love of fashion contagious. Here's Vogue Creative Editorial Director, Mark Guiducci. 

Mark Guiducci: I think Carrie Bradshaw, I mean, before her, the idea of fashion maybe was foreign, exotic, scary. You can imagine people seeing the things that she wore and saying who on earth would wear that, but you loved her. 

Hamish Bowles: Once again, Sally Singer. 

Sally Singer: Well, I think the character, Carrie Bradshaw was, you know, sort of a highly influential figure for people who love fashion, whether they understand that they love fashion or not. In part, because she took such delight, such solace from shopping. 

Laird Borelli-Persson: I think "Sex and the City" demonstrated a great joy of dressing up. The joy and ebulllience that came with dressing up. 

Hamish Bowles: Although fashion was no doubt a source of joy for Carrie Bradshaw, for other characters, it was more about function than form. 

Mark Guiducci: Miranda Hobbs, played by Cynthia Nixon is I think probably Carrie's actual best friends. She's the practical one. She's a Harvard educated lawyer with this fiery red hair and she's an ambitious working mom. And of the four women she has the most practical wardrobe. She's the one who is in like a pencil skirt suit, either on her way or on the way home from the office. 

Hamish Bowles: Here's Cynthia Nixon again. 

Cynthia Nixon: Miranda's always seen as the, accurately so, the least glamorous character. And it was really important to me that she dressed like a person really would have dressed. And so a lot of Miranda's work wear it was just suits, suits, suits, suits. A lot of pants suits, but sometimes the skirts .Blazers just blazers for days. And pat field who was dressing me, you know, did a beautiful job and I wear so many great suits, and Armani, and like wonderful pinstripes and terrific stuff. But at a certain point, particularly when we got to the movies, but even later in the series, I think Pat Field was like, "If I put you in another suit, I'm going to throw up." You know, "No more suits, um, kill me now, I'm going to take a scissor to all these suits, these black and Navy suits." So finally we started to mix it up and it started to be a little more, you know, skirts and blouses and cool belts and very, very dressed up and still, I guess, in some imaginary universe office wear. But like incredibly chic and incredibly accessorized.

Hamish Bowles: The wardrobe selection on "Sex and the City" was groundbreaking. It brought the world of high fashion and to millions of living rooms around the globe. This is Mark Guiducci. 

Mark Guiducci: It would be hard to find a precedent in TV, maybe in film, but not TV, where the characters knew so much and cared so much about fashion and used it to establish their characters. And also assume that their audience would too. 

Laird Borelli-Persson: TV is a very democratic medium. 

Hamish Bowles: This is Vogue's Archive editor, Laird Borelli-Persson. 

Laird Borelli-Persson: Much more democratic than fashion, but the embrace of fashion by television, by characters like Carrie Bradshaw and their stylists brought fashion into that broader range and introduced it to a wider audience than would have been watching fashion TV, or buying expensive magazines that covered the seasons for example. 

Hamish Bowles: For a show that reveled in fashion, "Sex and the City" was adored by people not in fashion who are delighted by characters taking sartorial risks with confidence. It demonstrated how positively exuberant fashion could be. 

Laird Borelli-Persson: Carrie Bradshaw and "Sex and the City" brought it into living rooms in a different way. In a fictional way that felt real, that had some connection to real life situations, but in a really glamorous way. 

Hamish Bowles: And for those who did work in the fashion industry or had extensive knowledge of fashion and long nurtured obsessions with designers, the show was deeply satisfying as well. 

Sarah Jessica Parker: I think the flood gates opened when Fendi, perhaps for their own reasons, offered to loan us a bag they were about to launch called the Baguette. And that really sort of opened the door, but that really changed everything. 

Patricia Field: It became a conscious thing. As the writers started writing, like when a mugger steals her bag and she's like, "It's not a bag, it's a Fendi Baguette!" 

Mugger: Give me your bag. 

Carrie Bradshaw: What? 

Mugger: Your bag! 

Carrie Bradshaw: It's a Baguette. 

Mugger: And your Manolo Blahniks. 

Carrie Bradshaw: What? No!

Hamish Bowles: The portrayal of someone who would confront a mugger over a certain designer bag, created allure around it as a must have item predicated as it is on the crazy idea of facing mortal danger and the defense of fashion. 

Laird Borelli-Persson: For fashion people, it was super, super, super exciting to tune into "Sex and the City" because there was the baguette that you wanted in real life. But for me as a young fashion editor, to see the work of Miguel Adrover, who I just think is one of the strongest New York designers we've ever had. But was very new and very niche and very small to have Carrie wear something of his on "Sex and the City" was just great. 

Sarah Jessica Parker: In Miguel's Case we just loved the work, but, you know, we would get pieces from these young designers and oh, my God, the beauty of the work, it was so touching. And it meant so much for us to have our hands on it, but we wanted to always find new voices in fashion. And sometimes you're finding a space to put something and it really, you have no rational reason, you know, Michael Patrick would come and he'd say why, and we'd say, okay, because, because we love this piece. It makes no sense. We understand that, we can't defend it your honor, but we simply love this designer and it's so different or so special. 

Laird Borelli-Persson: Carrie, as a character was experimental and took chances with her clothing and, you know, you could argue if you liked it or not, but that was part of the point of it. It caused conversation. I really do feel that fashion was a fifth character. 

Hamish Bowles: What was appealing about the show for the fashion world was the authenticity of the fashion. Here's Vogue editor, Virginia Smith. 

Virginia Smith: Typically, when you saw characters on a television show, as a fashion person, you were like, "Ooh, you know, they really got that wrong." But not with "Sex and the City." it was so influential on the fashion industry actually for many, many years, it was remarkable. 

Hamish Bowles: After the break, hear more about how the "Sex and the City" costume department filled Carrie Bradshaw's closet. As an actress, Sarah Jessica Parker had a strong, personal engagement with fashion and working with the costume department was a dream come true. 

Sarah Jessica Parker: I was completely hypnotized by that entire department. That department is important to see as a larger organism, because it was a world unto itself. It was Pat Field and Molly Rogers and Danny Santiago. And then over the many years, there were these young amazing, we called them shoppers, but they were, you know, many sets of extra eyeballs in the darkest corners of the burrows and warehouses that shall remain nameless purposefully. So that department was this very, I can't even kind of describe the sort of happiness that existed when you cross the threshold of that fitting room. I was wanting very much to try anything. Absolutely anything she laid out in front of me. And Pat and Molly, and I, we just sort of developed a language very quickly. And I would say, you know, Pat being in the world was super important, but I think also it was a true conversation always. 

Hamish Bowles: Those conversations often ran late into the night. As Sarah Jessica, Pat Field, and the costume department meticulously poured over the details of each ensemble. 

Sarah Jessica Parker: Those fittings sometimes were five, six hours long. They sometimes started at 11:00 at night finishing at two or three in the morning. You know, got to the point where we were doing two episodes simultaneously. So we were sometimes fitting 30, 40, 45, 50 outfits. 

Patricia Field: I never really really wanted to reuse wardrobe. It was like, "Why the audience saw it already? Let's give them something new." It's just as easy to give them something new as to repeat something they've already seen. 

Hamish Bowles: Assembling each outfit involved, documenting and re documenting the looks until they were tweaked to perfection.

Patricia Field: In those days it was Polaroids. We would Polaroid all the outfits and then go through them. And then we would attach them to the script. Meaning she's going to the coffee shop, so she could be more casual on that day, you know, it just depends on the scene. So it was collaborative and it was a good, good, good collaboration. I love working with somebody who gets it. She got it. 

Hamish Bowles: The costuming embraced and was often ahead of the curve of fashion that was emerging from New York at the time. Carrie dressed precisely in the manner of the hippest young fashion assistants and made the same kinds of choices that they would have been making. Beyond the authenticity of the characters overall look, "Sex and the City", stay true to authentic fashion pieces. As Juicy Couture co-founder Gela Nash-Taylor points out.

Gela Nash-Taylor: One of the things that was brilliant about "Sex and the City" is that it wasn't fake so that if it was Juicy, it was Juicy. And if it was Jimmy Choo, they said we're wearing Jimmy Choos. And if it was Gucci, it wasn't Poochie. It was Gucci. Like those girls were wearing real designers and they weren't sort of mocking it up. It was a Gucci suit or a Pucci dress or Jimmy Choo shoes or Manolo Blahniks and they were the gods, right. The going into the Vogue closet and pulling out the Manolo Mary Jane's, you know, it was like, that was amazing.

Carrie Bradshaw: Manolo Blahnik Mary Janes. I thought these were urban shoe myth. These are authentic patent leather. And if they don't fit, so help me I'm going to wear them anyway. 

Hamish Bowles: Once the series hit its stride, designers began opening their doors to "Sex and the City's" costume department and loaning pieces to be featured on the show. The show's effect on fashion sales was palpable as experienced firsthand by the founders of Juicy Couture, Pamela Skaist-Levy and Gela Nash-Taylor. 

Pamela Skaist-Levy: Pat Fields called us one day and said, "I'm doing a show called "Sex and the City" we would like to get some of your clothes for Sarah Jessica Parker." We sent her a bar green strapless, amazing Terry cloth dress. 

Gela Nash-Taylor: She would wear a dress like that on "Sex and the City". And we would sell thousands, millions. Like people would go crazy seeing her in something like that "Sex and the City" was amazing. Amazing. 

Laird Borelli-Persson: "Sex and the City" helped make Manolo Blahnik, you know, a household word. And they were often in the D&G boutique down in Soho and you know, they were always drinking their martinis, you know, and those glasses. You know, you can just picture them, you know, sitting on those tall stools with their legs crossed in their high heels.

Hamish Bowles: Here's Vogue editor, Laird Borelli-Persson. 

Laird Borelli-Persson: Things that appeared on "Sex and the City" and especially things that became associated with Carrie, suddenly became household names. Manolo maybe had been working for a long time and he was successful, but suddenly it was like to have a pair of Minolos was like a sign of being fashionable or having made it. Kind of like, I guess, a sort of equivalent to having a mink coat in the fifties or a string of pearls. It signaled a with-it-ness or an in-ness, or a chic ness that in turn was linked back to "Sex and the City". And the idea of a young life with few responsibilities and disposable income to spend on fashion. 

Hamish Bowles: Classic "Sex and the City" moments that spotlighted certain designer garments fed into the idea of must have it pieces from a particular pair of shoes to a specific handbag.

Salesperson: It's not a bag, it's a Birkin. 

Carrie Bradshaw: Later that week, I had a religious experience at Manolo Blahnik. 

Charlotte York: You have to go. 

Charlotte's Mother-in-Law: Don't you hustle me out young lady. This is Chanel. 

Sarah Jessica Parker: Sweetie I just spent $395 on a pair of open-toed Gucci's last week. This is not the place to be frugal.

Hamish Bowles: In season three, John Galliano for Dior's newspaper dress made a headline worthy entrance. After being caught in the act of having an affair with the infamous Mr. Big, her series long on again, off again lover, Carrie Bradshaw steps out in the dress as she sets out to confront Big's wife and cleanse her conscience.

Carrie Bradshaw: I never, never meant for any of this to happen and if there was something that I could do to take it all away, I would. But I can't. So I came here today because I needed to say how sorry I am. 

Hamish Bowles: Even when Carrie is remorseful and vulnerable, her newspaper dress invests her with some measure of freedom and confidence, as she grapples with her guilt and accepts scorn. 

Sarah Jessica Parker: The impact of that dress is the long shot. It's that long, wide lens. I think she's crossing the street, there's a sort of like jubilant liberation to wearing that dress. 

Hamish Bowles: The high-impact Galliano dress serves as a scarlet letter on a repentant woman with burdensome news to share. Following arguably the season's most climatic scene, Carrie walks down the streets of New York in slow motion, contemplating her place in the universe. The show didn't sugar coat its complicated characters. It was revolutionary in giving full dimension to these women. By not sterilizing their humanity, the series was perceived as a piece of feminist culture. Once again, Cynthia Nixon. 

Cynthia Nixon: At the beginning of the show, this question would come up of whether the show was feminist or not. And reporters would ask us this question and we would all look at each other kind of dumbfounded. And we were like, well, of course it's feminist. It being a feminist show didn't mean that we were showing women to be perfect or infallible or always right or always virtuous. Really quite the opposite. All of these women make mistakes and Carrie, the main character in particular, makes terrible decision after terrible self-destructive decision and does a lot of damage. I think the idea is you couldn't be a feminist and like want to put on a pair of high heels and a sexy dress. Which just seems crazy, which is, I think why some women who actually are feminists sort of shun this label. It's like Emma, Goldman, the, the famous anarchist saying if I can't dance, I don't want to be part of your revolution.

Hamish Bowles: As feminist and as fashion forward it's "Sex and the City" was at its core, it was a show that told the stories of four very real and very flawed friends trying to make it in the world. Audiences were drawn to the unwavering bond these women shared. Cynthia Nixon once again. 

Cynthia Nixon: We showed moments of empowerment and triumph, but we also showed that it can be really hard, you know, to be in New York and be out there by yourself and trying to navigate it. And that's why your friends were so important because when you got a little beat up in your love life or your professional life, you you'd come home and lick your wounds and they would be there to give you a hug. 

Charlotte York: Maybe we could be each other's soulmates, and then we could let men be just these great, nice guys to have fun with.

Samantha Jones: Well, that sounds like a plan. 

Virginia Smith: You felt 

like you were sort of right there with those girls having lunch or breakfast with them and going out and having a cocktail. 

Hamish Bowles: Here's Vogue editor, Virginia Smith. 

Virginia Smith: You wanted to be, I guess, a part of their world, whether you were or not. I think they drew us all in, in various ways, whoever you related to the most. And it was a pretty remarkable combination of women. 

Hamish Bowles: This is Vogue editor Mark Guiducci. 

And the kinds of conversations that these women were having over brunch and dinner, which were key scenes in every episode and reflective of the kinds of things people actually talk about, had never been seen on TV before. 

Cynthia Nixon: So while the show had this tremendous fantasy element, there was a rule in the writers room, which was that any plot line that we had could only have happened to one of the writers directly or happen to someone that one of the writers knew first hand. 

Hamish Bowles: Cynthia Nixon once again. 

Cynthia Nixon: So that although outrageous things happened, they were all actually things that had really happened. And it couldn't be like my cousin's, brother's dentist's, you know, nephew knew a guy. It really had to be firsthand or like verifiable, like I've talked to the source. And so I have to say while we're all very dressed up and we had a lot of disposable income and there was an endless supply of good looking successful men who we wanted to date and they went into date us, at the core, there was this reality happening. 

Hamish Bowles: Rooted in these realities the series struck a balance between everyday comedic mishaps, without glossing over the complexity of some of life's most difficult questions and conversations. And one particular episode from season four, for instance, the characters ruminate over Miranda's possible abortion. 

Charlotte York: How ya you felling? 

Miranda Hobbs: Pretty freaked out. Charlotte I didn't do it. I didn't do it. I'm keeping the baby.

Cynthia Nixon: And one of the things that I loved about it is how the whole episode was handled. That like abortion was a totally viable option for her and I loved also the way in which the other women, at least, I think, I guess Carrie and Samantha were very, you know, forthcoming about. Yeah I've had an abortion. Yeah. I've had to, you know. 

Mark Guiducci: I think probably the next time a television show sparked as much controversy was when Lena Dunham's "Girls" came out also on HBO, but there probably wouldn't have been a "Girls" if it hadn't been for "Sex and the City." 

Cynthia Nixon: You know, feel like the shows that really break through on television, what they're doing is they're capturing a moment that's happening in the real world, but our culture hasn't caught up with it yet. So I, I always think of the Cosby show. Like it didn't, it didn't create black middle-class America, but we hadn't seen that on TV before. Our show was like, they're out in the world, pursuing their careers, pursuing love. Shopping and dressing and going out to restaurants and going to cultural events. And like, they're not waiting to find quote unquote, the one for their lives to start. They are in the thick of their lives and they are, they are loving it. 

Hamish Bowles: "Sex and the City" gained its place in popular culture by depicting women solving real everyday problems while looking fabulous in the process. Here's Laird Borelli-Persson. 

Laird Borelli-Persson: There are so many reasons why "Sex and the City" won't go away and people don't want it to go away. Part of it is fashion and the joy there is in dressing and the joy there is in critiquing and criticizing the dressing choices made by the characters. But I think at base it's really about seeing oneself in the characters. Identifying with a trait or an aesthetic that says I'm a Manolo person, I'm a dress person, I'm brash and am confident in my sexuality. 

Sarah Jessica Parker: I think the thing that we were trying to say with Carrie, you know, there don't have to be rules the most interesting and exciting and attractive people are the people that look most like themselves. And you didn't have to want to mimic Carrie or be like her, but she was herself. 

Hamish Bowles: "Sex and the City's" fashion relevance is a large credit to the creative approach of Pat Field. 

Sally Singer: I think that was like a fashion fairy godmother on the show to those characters. 

Hamish Bowles: This is Sally Singer. 

Sally Singer: I think the characters on "Sex and the City" would never live New York the way Pat lived it, like they'd never be that on the scene and that cool. But everyone can take some of the kind of magic from that world and make whatever scene there in just a little more magical because of that she's allowed a general public, a huge general public, the world over to learn through her styling that everyone can be fabulous and fun and living their best life through clothes. So you have nothing to be ashamed of ever. And that is a very generous, wonderful place to be. 

Hamish Bowles: Once more, Pat Field. 

Patricia Field: Let me put it to you this way. I love optimistic fashion. That's what I relate to. That's what I'm good at. But the reputation of a kind of bowled me over, actually. I mean, people tell me, you know, when they've had a hard day, they go in their bedroom and they have the DVD set and they watch "Sex and the City" just to relax. And I always remember that because that's a wonderful compliment to my work. 

Hamish Bowles: Cynthia, once again. 

Cynthia Nixon: When people say, do you ever get sick of always being known for "Sex and the City"? Are people still coming up to you about it all these years later? And I was like, absolutely not because I'm so proud of it. I'm very, I'm very proud of it. I'm a fan too. 

Patricia Field: I think what women got from the shows, they learned to have fun with their clothes and themselves, and the timing was right because women were coming into their own and it was kind of an emancipation.

Hamish Bowles: Carrie Bradshaw was a character who believed in the magic of the world and in the unique possibilities for fashion to create and enhance those moments. Her documentation of those moments in her life and fashion's role in them was what she chronicled dutifully in her weekly column. It was a precursor to the fashion writing that would move from the exclusive pages of media publications onto the burgeoning world of online blogs. In our next episode, stay tuned for a close examination of the rising phenomenon of bloggers in the 2000s and how they changed the face of fashion forever.

In Vogue: the 2000s is presented by Anna Wintour, produced by Vogue in partnership with Pod People. Production support by Jacquelyn Jamjoom, Tony Mantia, Rachael King, Matt Sav, Aimee Machado, Madison Lusby, Fredia Lucas, Marie McCoy Thompson, Morgane Fouse, Mariah Dennis, Adam Raymonda, Nicki Stein, Percia Verlin, and Stefanie Bichara. Theme music composed by DJ Ghostdad. Vogue's editorial team is Laird Borelli-Persson, Mark Holgate, Nicole Phelps, and myself, Hamish Bowles. Special thanks to Vogue's Creative Editorial Director Mark Guiducci, VP of Digital Video Programming and Development Robert Semmer, VP of Audio Julie Shen, and Director of Podcasts Nico Steele. Please do subscribe to the podcast. It helps new listeners find the show. You can find additional information, incredible imagery, and episode references in the show notes or at vogue.com/podcast. I'm your host, Hamish Bowles. Until next week, in Vogue.