From Vintage Issey Miyake To Rachel Comey, Beef’s Fashion Is As Dramatic As The Show

Beef. Ali Wong as Amy in episode 101 of Beef. Cr. Andrew Cooper/Netflix © 2023 Lee Sung Jin’s Beef, dropping on Netflix April 6, kicks off with a high-speed car chase through the residential streets of LA’s San Fernando Valley after a near fender bender in the parking lot of Forsters, a fictional Costco-like store. Driving his beat-up pickup truck, down-on-his-luck contractor Danny Cho (Steven Yeun) initially assumes his road rage nemesis is a man. But, as the camera soon reveals, instead of Dominic Toretto, a petite woman sits behind the wheel of a white Mercedes SUV.  Later, safe in her garage, self-made entrepreneur Amy Lau (Ali Wong) steadily regains her composure. Her ensemble – an ivory cable-knit bucket hat (with the brim playfully flipped up), a quilted oatmeal jacket by Tonlé, and a tonal Eileen Fisher cashmere sweater – feels as soft and calming as Amy’s Insta-popular plant brand, Kōyō Haus. It also feels intentionally antithetical to her code red outburst from earlier. “She is very curated in that ‘Instagram-y’ way,” says costume designer Helen Huang. This idea of contradictions – that underneath our pristinely curated appearances is a simmering well of complexity, fury, and shame – is a recurrent theme throughout the 10-episode series. “Amy has a costume that she puts on every day and that’s the image that she projects,” says Huang, who previously dressed Emma Roberts in Holidate, won an Emmy as part of costume designer Lou Eyrich’s team on American Horror Story, and imagined a dystopian future in Station Eleven.  Beef. Ali Wong as Amy in episode 101 of Beef. Cr. Andrew Cooper/Netflix © 2023 For Amy’s Calabasas mom-fluencer persona, Huang looked to Korean American designer and owner of Los Angeles-based Mohawk General Store, Bo Carney, for inspiration. Huang also referenced the sleek and comforting vibe of Kōyō Haus, which an overwhelmed Amy wants to sell to Forsters to finally spend time with her Insta-perfect family. “We tried to use a lot of organic fabrics; things that are cozier. We tried to dress her from the perspective of an artistic person,” says Huang.  Amy’s calming Coastal Grandma tones are a sartorial front for the dark emotions and impulses she keeps hidden from her family and world at large. Throughout the series, Danny and Amy proceed to pour their angst over societal and familial expectations, insecurities, resentments, and disappointments into increasingly abhorrent behavior as they seek revenge upon each other. The two first meet face-to-face (neither actually saw each other during the road rage chase) after Danny cons his way into Amy’s picture-perfect house and interrupts Amy partaking in an intimate moment. Beef. Ali Wong as Amy in episode 101 of Beef. Cr. Courtesy of Netflix © 2023 “[Wong] actually wanted a skirt for the masturbation sequence,” explains Huang, about Amy’s languid set from Baserange. “We wanted to be extremely neutral for that scene, because that scene is super, super intense.” The natural linen texture perfectly aligns with the gentle, earthy facade Amy constructs to mask her true disposition and intentions.  Later, preparing to seal the Forsters deal, Amy heads to Las Vegas for the retail juggernaut’s annual meeting. Going through an existential crisis, Amy gives herself a style transformation and debuts a severe bleached blonde bob and her version of a “power suit”: a sleeveless, deconstructed, black pinstriped Proenza Schouler dress with a fringe hem. “Amy dresses arty, so she would definitely keep her sense of self in that way, but [then] transition into a more serious color, in her mind,” says Huang, who evolved Amy into darker colors as she makes progressively questionable decisions.  Beef. (L to R) Steven Yeun as Danny, Ali Wong as Amy in episode 107 of Beef. Cr. Courtesy of Netflix © 2022 In the deceptive calm before the final storm, Amy returns to her natural hair color and reassuring neutrals, like a white cutout dress by Rachel Comey. “At that moment, she felt like she had her life more together, so to shift back to the white felt more natural,” says Huang. The two adversaries have a brief moment of connection. But that’s quickly annihilated after the dress literally reveals Amy’s reprehensible action that will lead to emotional and physical carnage to those closest to the duo.  Beef. Steven Yeun as Danny in episode 101 of Beef. Cr. Andrew Cooper/Netflix © 2023 Her plush hues and architectural silhouettes also diverge from El Segundo-based apartment dweller Danny’s all-thrifted utilitarian T-shirts and zip-up jackets in grays and blues. “That was important to me, to contrast the different Asian communities, and where they live,” says Huang, who grew up in Los Angeles. For first-generation Korean American Danny, she referenced her step-brothers who hail from the industrial, LAX-adjacent city. “Even though his clothes are not as expensive — or as curated as Amy’s — he still has an image of what he wants to pr