Production Designer Alison Gartshore reveals how she took the “Bridgerton” eye candy to the next level.

For two seasons now, Bridgerton has created a lavish, lush world that reimagines the Regency era in a provocative, addictive way — a world so inviting and immersive that Bridgerton isn’t just one of Netflix’s top shows of all time; it’s also actually spawned a fashion trend, a whole world of consumer products, live-like-a-Bridgerton experiences, and an IRL Queen’s Ball that’s made fans around the world line up to take part in.

From the very beginning, Bridgerton’s producers, along with then-production designer Will Hughes-Jones, were exacting and thorough in adapting Julia Quinn’s Bridgerton book series from the page to the screen; from its 11 elaborate balls or being shot at some 100 locations in the first season, Bridgerton oozed authenticity because the teams making it stopped at nothing to make it feel big and real.

But if you thought seasons one and two were big, hold on to your bonnet — season three promises to be the biggest and most expansive iteration of the Bridgerton story yet.

With new showrunner Jess Brownell guiding the narrative, Bridgerton’s third installment puts the spotlight on Penelope Featherington (Nicola Coughlan) and Colin Bridgerton (Luke Newton), whose shaky friendship takes on a new dimension when she recruits him to help her find a husband, and he’s forced to confront feelings he might not have acknowledged. Friendship is a big theme for the season overall, as the season also explores Penelope’s heartbreaking rift with her former bestie, Eloise (Claudia Jessie), who now has a new, unlikely BFF. And with Penelope gaining more attention in the ton, her secret alter ego, Lady Whistledown, becomes harder to keep clandestine, creating a palpable tension as wounds, unspoken desires, and secrets simmer to a boil.

“It’s a very different world this time,” says executive producer Shonda Rhimes, “because we’re dealing with a relationship that’s been based on an underlying lie. Penelope has never revealed to Colin that she is Lady Whistledown — and he has a real problem with Lady Whistledown. So, to see that play out, it feels really fresh.”

As the drama is amplified, so too is the world all these characters play in. This go-round, Bridgerton is grander than ever before, with more eye candy for viewers to savor. “This season,” Brownell says, “we’re returning to a lot of our iconic stages, sets, and locations. And then, there are some new locations as well. We’re having to travel further and further afield to get some of these locations, but it makes it like summer camp with the crew.”

So, what exactly makes this Bridgerton bigger and bolder than ever? As season three Production Designer Alison Gartshore tells Shondaland, fans will see that reflected in a few key ways. “Having been with the project since day one, I didn’t want to change it,” she says. “It’s more about embellishing.” Here’s how they did it.

“The main difference was the balls,” says Gartshore. She was steadfast in wanting to maintain the vision established by Hughes-Jones and set decorator Gina Cromwell, looking more to bolster the vision rather than change it. “Thinking about where we might be able to enhance and push the boundaries, I thought we could be a bit more theatrical with the balls. I think we’ve pushed the balls a little. We certainly got quite theatrical,” she says.

Bridgerton’s balls have, of course, been a central element of the series from the start; they are, after all, the setting for Queen Charlotte’s favorite pastime — finding her diamond of the season — and where denizens of the ton gather to size one another up and spill tea. This time, the balls go to the next level, mainly by having distinct themes that Gartshore and her team played up for maximum impact. “For the first time, we had themes for the balls, which I think really helped in the design process,” she says. “It gave us all a hook to hang the design on — a starting gate that we could go through and run with the design.”

Among them? A four-seasons ball, a new ball from Queen Charlotte, and a ball centered around innovation, where the ton’s smarty-pants come to show off their forward-thinking ideas.

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Nicola Coughlan, as Penelope Featherington, and Sam Phillips, as Lord Debling, rehearse a ballroom dance scene with choreographer Jack Murphy for the third season of Bridgerton.

For the seasons ball, Gartshore and her team aimed to convey spring, summer, fall, and winter through color and hundreds of flowers, creating a stunning romantic effect that makes the viewer feel like they’ve been swept through all four seasons in one scene. “The visual had to be a very beautiful ombré effect, blending seamlessly through the color palettes,” she says. “We thought, ‘What would represent spring?’ So, for me it was lemon and pale pink and lime green — new shoots on plants and trees. Summer may be purples, blues, strong pinks. We all know the autumnal colors — browns, golds, and russets — and then winter, you’ve got frosty whites and red berries standing out.”

The queen’s ball, Gartshore says, centered on Queen Charlotte putting on a performance of the Eros and Psyche ballet — a story rooted in classic Greek mythology — and is where we get to see her rocking that insane wig that had the internet buzzing. “We built royal boxes for all the main characters, and for Queen Charlotte, a raised elevated royal box from which she could look down,” Gartshore reveals. “We had a stage set which was a Greek temple ruin, and the ballet took place on that. You weave the themes of the balls into the sets much more easily than you do the day-to-day household sets, really, because you try and weave their characters into those spaces more than themes. The set-decoration team is very clever with their choice of possessions for each character, and it all builds a picture of who that person is.”

Biggest of all is the ball where Lord Hawkins, an eccentric new character, makes his presence felt. “The innovations ball is quite a departure for Bridgerton,” Gartshore says. “It was deliberately so because the character who was putting on the ball is an inventor — kind of like the Elon Musk of the Regency world — so the ball had to be something that reflected his character.” The result? An engineering-heavy gala Gartshore describes as “masculine” and “geometric” with lots of innovative elements that were novel at the time, including machinery, astrological-based devices, and even lamps — a breakthrough invention that helped, among other things, miners go into caves.

Fans will see more new locations this season too. “We’re trying to broaden our locations so that we aren’t going to the same old places every season,” says location manager Tony Hood. “So, we were on the hunt looking for bigger places instead of trying to make the same old places look a little bit different.”

Bridgerton has always made use of historical heritage sites when it’s being filmed, with sites like London’s Ranger’s House, the iconic Bridgerton abode, and Wilton House, which goes back to 1544 and has been the site of many of the queen’s rooms, serving as familiar facades to fans. For season three, the team traveled farther into the English countryside to use both new locations and repurposed spaces we’ve already seen by shooting parts that were previously untapped. New places include Claydon House in Buckinghamshire and Kingston Bagpuize in Oxfordshire, although what happens in both places is a mystery that will soon be revealed as the episodes play out.

In some cases, places we’ve already seen expand: Genevieve Delacroix, the modiste who keeps all the fashionistas of the ton looking fresh, for example, sees her boutique become larger since her business has grown since she entered an agreement with Lady Whistledown. Now, fans will see a roomier shop (with interiors created on a stage) and new glimpses of its exterior shot on London’s Woburn Walk, featuring a whole row of charming Regency-era street shop fronts.

“We don’t do anything small in Bridgerton,” Hood says, “so we changed the whole street. We occupied all 16 shop fronts on the whole walkway. We’re really showing Genevieve’s success.”

One more way Bridgerton expands this season is with its large-scale scenes brought to life by set pieces, or standout, large-scale sequences or scenes in a TV show or film that require more logistics, coordination, and resources than most others in the story — somebody jumping out of an exploding building and landing on a car in an action film, for example.

Such a set piece manifests in episode three of Bridgerton’s third season by way of a hot-air balloon moment that’s sure to have tongues wagging and romantics swooning.

In what is considered Bridgerton’s first major stunt sequence, a hot-air balloon demonstration goes awry, causing some beloved characters to find themselves in danger and Colin springing into action and becoming a hero. The thrilling scene takes place in Painshill Park, a location also used in season one when Daphne and Simon walked across the bridge together, although the new scene is depicted in an entirely different area. “I think that is the biggest piece in terms of a thing that we had to film,” Gartshore tells Shondaland. “[It was] ‘How do we do it? Is it all CGI? Is it all effects? How do we build the basket?’ It came with quite a lot of technical challenges.”

Making the dreamy dramatic moment come to life involved Astroturf, crash mats, a huge crane, and a fierce battle with Mother Nature, as it rained during the whole week of shooting. Naturally, the brilliant Bridgerton minds made it happen, making it one of many moments that add up to a world that looks and feels like the Bridgerton world fans know and love, just larger and more fleshed out.

“I could see the opportunity to make [things] more spectacular and theatrical,” Gartshore tells Shondaland. “And that’s what we did across the board.”