🤐 SPOILER ALERT 🤐
As you watch Season 2 of Heartstopper, look closely at the wave mural in the hallway of Truham Boys School. Let your eyes take it in. Do you see anything there — maybe a boat? Now think back to Season 1. Was it there then? For that matter, were you aware that all the T’s on the Truham uniforms of Charlie (Joe Locke), Nick (Kit Connor), Tao (William Gao), and Isaac (Tobie Donovan) change throughout the seasons in Season 1?
Heartstopper is full of carefully crafted touches meant to delight superfans of the show, created by Alice Oseman, and of the beloved series of graphic novels, also by Oseman. Behind every “Heartstopper moment,” when the characters’ hearts flutter so much that doodles float around them, there’s a whole set pulling things together to make the magic. Learn about every detail you might have missed from the cast and crew of Heartstopper, who walked Tudum through all the Easter eggs they planted in Season 2 when we visited the set in November 2022.
1. New elements were added to the wave mural in Season 2.
“It’s been really fun revisiting spaces this season and adding subtle, elemental changes to them that hopefully fans will see and really like,” said production designer Carys Beard. You might remember the wave mural on the halls of Truham in Season 1. While Season 1 traveled through the seasons, Season 2 is primarily set during the summer. “So we tried to add the heat and sun where we can, and sparkle,” she said. “There’s a little boat in there, too.” Her team also updated the mural on the sports field, turning Oseman’s leaf motif into flowers for Season 2.
2. The walls of the art room changed in Season 1 and blossomed later on in the year.
While Beard didn’t design Season 1, she did work on it. “What they did beautifully last year is really have the room change and develop,” she said. Season 2 features the art room in a few scenes. “This time we have a flashback in there, which is actually quite an unhappy memory. We duplicated the tree [on the floor from Season 1] and made all the roots gnarly,” to reflect the darker tone. Another art-room scene sees the gang help Tao plan how to ask Elle (Yasmin Finney) on a date, so the production designers brought in new art projects — some previously seen in the background of Season 1 and some new pieces. “Again, we were trying to amp up the heat and the warmth of the colors, because we’re in summer now. We added flowers to the tree on the wall as well.”
3. The production design department tried to weave Oseman’s drawings from the comics into everything.
“Everything needs to have a wobbly line or just a friendly approach to it,” said set decorator Maxwell Fine. “We’re obsessed with the leaf illustrations Alice draws. And there’s lots of thunderbolts and stars and butterflies, too. We try to seek those out when we’re styling every set.”
4. The T on the Truham blazers shifts seasonally.
“It’s our little magic thing,” said costume designer Adam Dee. In Season 1, the T’s sewn onto the blazers reflected the different seasons, starting with winter and evolving as the narrative and characters progress. “It’s literally about them blossoming,” added costume supervisor Janine Marr. Naturally, Season 2’s patches reflect summertime bloom. The costume department also designed special badges with hearts on them for a few of Nick and Charlie’s “Heartstopper moments.” Like in Season 1, “there’s a bit when Nick says, ‘I want to talk to you,’ and Charlie imagines him saying, ‘Oh, I’m gay.’ And the badge swaps with little hearts. It’s really subtle, you’ve got to catch it!” said Dee.
5. Season 1’s color palette was blue and yellow. Season 2’s is pink and pistachio. And that’s woven throughout the story.
“We’ve got a very strong color palette for the show, which was established in Season 1,” said Beard. “It’s always, ‘How do we bring our color palette and Heartstopper world into this space?’ So it’s still authentic, but you really push the magic so that everything across the board always feels like Heartstopper.” That dedication to color palette extended even to details like choosing the crockery and flowers on set. And when a real location didn’t match, the production department would re-dress it. “The souvenir shop [in Paris] was really fun,” Beard continued. “For the merchandise we had there, we used Alice’s style of drawings and drew some Paris locations that we printed onto merchandise to send to the shop [to be used as props alongside the store’s real merchandise]. So even those elements are in our world, and we had our characters buy them in the scene.”
6. Tao and Elle’s big Season 2 kiss was as big a deal for the actors as it was for the audience.
After all, the main question Finney was asked after Season 1 wrapped was, “Oh my God, why didn’t they kiss?” But the slow burn was worth the wait, building up to their first kiss in one of the romantic cities ever, Paris (aka, the City of Love)! “They’ve made a lot of magic moments [in Heartstopper], but it fills my heart with joy to finally have a love story where a trans person is just happy and positive and they get to just be in love in such a natural way,” said Finney.
7. The Heartstopper gang went to Disneyland Paris.
While filming on location in France, the cast popped over to Disneyland Paris, going on rides like the Tower of Terror and noshing on eats like Mickey Mouse–shaped donuts with Nutella inside. “I loved it. I’d only been to Disneyland once in my life and I was really young, because I don’t remember it,” said Bradley Riches, who plays James.
8. Production brought Paris back to England to film the hotel interiors.
The exteriors of the kids’ French hotel were shot in Paris, but the interiors for the boys, girls, and teachers’ rooms were built where the show films in Slough, England. “The hotel’s like a faded grunge feel of a hotel that was once wonderful, but has since had several rounds of new management after a refit in the ’80s, and the parts were changed in the ’90s,” said Beard. “We’re keeping it a believable space that the school trip has gone to, but still magical and romantic.”
9. Nick and Charlie are one of those couples that dress alike.
Dee designed Nick and Charlie’s Season 2 outfits to reflect their evolution as a couple and to show their closeness. The costume department intentionally made their looks converge more this year while keeping them simple. “Nick was very sporty last year and Charlie had his vintage and his stripes, so they’ve started to influence each other,” Dee said, noting how the pair’s looks are beginning to converge. “And obviously Charlie’s stealing way more of Nick’s clothes this year, like his jumpers.”
10. Nick and Charlie wear their outfits from the Volume 3 cover in Season 2.
When the gang went to Paris, Dee saw a chance to pay homage to Oseman’s original artwork for Volume 3 of the graphic novels. “Because some of the fans know the looks so well, you’re kind of under a bit of pressure to not completely copy it but [do] little nods to it,” said Dee. Connor and Locke ended up wearing their cover looks on their first day of filming in Paris. According to Dee, “All the fans started to notice straight away.”
11. The art department also found the matching backpack and more elements from the Volume 3 cover.
You can thank production buyer Zoe Seiffert for sourcing Charlie’s Fjällräven bag. The art department also had a Paris map made to match the one on the cover. What’s more, they printed postcards that resembled one of Charlie’s from the back cover of the book and snuck them into the background of sets, like the hotel where the gang stays. “And we wrote Charlie’s writing tutorials in the back of the book,” Beard added. “I hope fans will slyly spot little nuggets like that.”
12. Imogen (Rhea Norwood) was meant to look like a total tourist in Paris, by the way.
“Of course Imogen just had to go for it,” said Marr. Down to the berets and stripes. “We kept seeing tourists dress like that when we were having little jaunts out.”
13. Heartstopper costumes always start with mood boards. Donovan even made one of his own.
“Tobie’s got some ideas about Isaac,” Dee said. “Last year, he and Alice got together and thought about what his look could be. So we worked some of that in, and he quite likes to play around a bit and suggest some things. He wanted to do little caps with little flowers on them this year, so we managed to get a couple of those in for Paris.”
14. #Bimogen coupling up was Sebastian Croft (who plays Ben) and Norwood’s idea.
“I’m not joking, we pitched #Bimogen to Alice and [executive producer] Patrick [Walters],” Croft said. The idea came to them during a rugby scene in Season 1 in which Imogen and Ben are standing next to each other. “We ended up spending way longer filming that scene than anticipated — neither of us had any idea how rugby works — so we were just like, ‘Let’s create #Bimogen.’ I’m taking full credit.”
15. Croft even wanted them to have matching necklaces!
“But Ben would never have gone for it,” Dee said. Ben’s fashion does soften though as the season progresses, and that was intentional. “So by the time it gets to the art exhibition, he’s had a little color change,” said Marr.
16. The gang’s style gets more grown up after Paris to reflect the cast growing up off-screen, too.
“We were a little bit nervous about them coming back this year, because they’d had the most extraordinary journey in six months — less than that,” said Marr. “But each one of them said they just felt a breath to come back to a safe space… They’re just one big gang again.”
17. Sahar’s (Leila Khan) style is very ’90s — as is her bedroom.
Dee recalled an image in the comics that was used in the casting call for Sahar, one in which the character sports a little orange jumper and checked trousers. “So, with Alice, we’re like, ‘Let’s try to get that in.’ And because she plays guitar at prom, we’re trying to make it a bit rock-y,” he said.
The production design department also used Sahar’s costumes as inspiration for her room. “We looked at this really fun graphic wallpaper and brought in a slight skate vibe for her. More grunge,” said production designer Beard. “And the Pakistani influence [is there] as well. We always try to bring an authentic element of that into each space.”
18. Darcy’s (Kizzy Edgell) bedroom reflects her playful personality.
While fans got a glimpse of Darcy’s room in Season 1, “it was a top shot, and her space was chaos, a mess, a real eclectic mix of stuff that she’s collected and put in her room,” said Beard. In Season 2, we see her full bedroom, with “the orange snail and Barbie hangers. Everyday items, but then what would Darcy do with them? How would she put them in her room for her space?”
19. The Folklore poster in Tara’s (Corinna Brown) bedroom was Walters’ request.
Not only does Taylor Swift’s song “Seven” off her Folklore album feature in the Season 2 finale, but Tara is canonically a Swiftie. And that’s how Walters wanted it. Tara portrayer Brown names “I Knew You Were Trouble” as her personal Taylor fave.
20. Tara’s room showcases her identity.
Brown was also excited to see so many details that are representative of a young Black girl in Tara’s room, like a Black Barbie doll and a scarf for wrapping her head up at night. Looking back on the shows she watched growing up, Brown said, “I can’t really remember a Black person going to bed with an actual headscarf on their head. On a lot of TV [shows], their hair’s still out, and I’m like, ‘That’s not true.’”
21. Brown always left messages for people behind the cameras on set.
While on set filming the Truth or Dare scene, Brown said, “Have a great day!” and blew kisses into the camera in between takes just because she was feeling friendly and wanted to spread some light into the world. And it’s quite a common occurrence. “See, I always [know] someone is definitely somewhere watching the monitor,” said Brown. “So I left you a message.”
22. There are a lot more casual clothes in Season 2, and we see more of Elle’s bohemian style.
Apart from Nick, Charlie, and maybe Tao, you rarely see any of the characters outside of their school uniforms in Season 1. Coming into Season 2, Finney in particular was excited about her character’s new look, which moved away from her “younger” style. “Her mum’s a bit bohemian, so that influenced her,” said Dee. “And in the comics, Alice said there’s a bit — is it canon, they say? — when they’re into vintage clothes. So we got loads more vintage stuff in for her this year.” And that includes Elle’s vintage prom dress. “They basically asked me what my dream prom dress would be, and I said I’d love it to be backless and have gorgeous sequins. It was more of a collaborative thing,” said Finney. “When I went to prom, my dress was just a plain black dress, so it’s nothing compared to Elle’s.”
23. Elle and Tao’s celebratory prom moment is a callback to Tara and Darcy’s big kiss in Season 1.
“In the first season, we did the big party, where the girls had their coming out kiss. So this year, we’re going for UV lighting,” said Marr. Dancing together under ultraviolet light, Elle and Tao’s complementary prom outfits — Tao with the hearts on his blazer and Elle with the crystals on her dress — literally glow as much as their hearts do. “It’s like a little rave in the prom,” said Dee.
24. The costume department made Baby Queen’s outfit before meeting her.
“Baby Queen has become the sound of Heartstopper,” said Oseman, with so many of her songs, like “Colours of You,” featured in Season 1. So it was inevitable that the artist would headline the prom in Season 2. (And since Sahar appears in her band, Khan took guitar lessons to prepare.) But when it came time to design her outfit, the costume team had just her music and her measurements to go off of. Luckily, the “punky teenager” outfit they devised was a good fit. “It’s a bit adjustable, but I think she’s game for anything as long as it looks like anything that she wears in her styling. It’s quite cool,” said Dee.
25. Gao is in a band called the Wasia Project — and they’re featured in the Season 2 finale.
On the set of Heartstopper, Gao hinted that his band might or might not feature in Season 2. As it turns out, their song “ur so pretty” does play at the very end of Episode 8, when Charlie is hesitant to send Nick an “I love you” text. “I feel very blessed. It’s just beautiful how everyone’s been with open ears and open hearts with the other sides of my life. And music’s such a big part of my life,” said Gao.
After unearthing all these Season 2 nuggets, we can only imagine the Easter eggs the Heartstopper crew will leave for us to find in Season 3… Till then, à bientôt!
All interviews included in this article were completed on the set of Heartstopper Season 2 in Nov. 2022.
Heartstopper Season 2 is now streaming.
