Inside the STEMinist Fantasy of the ‘Lessons in Chemistry’ TV Show Set

How do you recreate the kitchen of a 1950s housewife? If you’re set designer Cat Smith—the designer of the hotly anticipated Lessons in Chemistry, which debuts in a limited series on Apple TV+ on October 13—you think like a 1950s man.

The series, adapted from Bonnie Garmus’s bestseller, focuses on the life of Elizabeth Zott (played by Brie Larson), who gives up her career as a chemist when she discovers she’s pregnant, only to become the accidental host of a cooking TV show, Supper at Six.

One of the stars of the series is a pink saltwater taffy–colored kitchen, which Smith brought to life by way of intense research; an aha moment, courtesy of Larson; and many eBay bids to get it just right.

Production designer Cat Smith painted the “Supper at Six” set in pink and blue so that a color contrast would show on black-and-white TV.

Originally, Smith, who has worked on The Dropout and Yellowjackets, first designed a ranch house–style kitchen set at Ace Mission Studios near downtown Los Angeles with oak cabinets and gingerbread-style detailing to reflect a warm and homey setting. Larson, however, immediately vetoed it. “She looked at it and was like, ‘Well, I love your kitchen, but that’s the problem. It’s got to be the guy producer’s idea of what a feminine kitchen is like and what women want in their kitchen,’” Smith tells ELLE DECOR.

“This guy really has no idea about women. This is his fictional idea of the perfect woman,” Smith explains. “It will be frilly and pink and not very useful.”

Smith reversed course, drawing on architect Paul R. Williams’s redesign of the legendary Beverly Hills Hotel and the studio offices of actor Lucille Ball for inspiration. She gave the pink-painted kitchen a blue trim that would pop on the fictionalized black-and-white TV image. Smith worked with wallpaper company Astek Home to create a print of gingham, stripes, and strawberries.

As for kitchen accessories, Smith and the set designers scoured eBay and online marketplaces for ginger jars, pots and pans, tiny paper hats for legs of lamb, as well as other domestic tchotchkes like a sewing kit (which Zott disposes of on camera, much to the network head’s dismay). Set decorator Lori Mazuer designed über-frilly and ultra-impractical sheer window curtains with (of course) ruffled edges, to which Zott takes a peek through and declares, “This is revolting.”

The set of novel’s “Supper at Six” cooking show.

For Smith, the design challenges brought her in touch with a period that she wanted to revisit—warts and all. “Both my grandmother and mother were brought up in this era,” she says. “Reliving that time period through this film set is the most fun you could ever have in understanding how they became who they are.”