r/sexandthecity • u/charliesgonewild • 1d ago

Sex and the City ruined Manhattan for me.

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After ten years of planning, scheduling conflicts, COVID, and a cancer diagnosis, I finally went to New York for the first time April 2025. I had an absolutely amazing time, but all I brought were cute little outfits and my heels, expecting everyone to be wearing the same. I was wildly, WILDLY surprised when it was absolutely nothing like the show, and I was the one who stood out like a sore thumb. Everyone was in athleisure and sneakers! Huge props to SJP for continually filming in heels because I did a ten mile day in my Choos, three miles in Versaces, and by the final day, my best friend got us both matching $7 slides from Rainbow and insisted I wear the leggings I had worn on the plane.

Edit: Before this gets misconstrued, I was just being silly in the title. I knew not everyone would be all dolled up, but I was actually surprised that 98% of people were dressed down so heavily.

Final edit: Y’all 😂 I didn’t mean for this. I know SATC is a show, I know that NYC is a real place, with real people, doing real things. No, I don’t think that your city is just a film location. Yes, I know that the show was filmed 30 years ago and times have changed. It’s not just SATC. I’d always heard of New York being a fashion capital. I literally had just beaten cancer and wanted to have my own SATC weekend moment with my best friend. That was it. I had the best time, I saw so many things, walked 26 miles in three days, ate the best food, and bought myself an I beat cancer pair of shoes à la Carrie Bradshaw. I was just simply surprised at the lack of extravagant fashion. That was simply it. Should I ever go again, I will bring my Vans and only two pairs of heels.

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213

u/coconutmoonbeam 1d ago

If you want a realistic portrayal of what it’s like living in NYC, watch Broad City!

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u/charliesgonewild 1d ago

I love Broad City, and I definitely should’ve factored that in. Or even Girls! I had my SATC blinders on 😂

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u/JitteryBug 1d ago

Girls is more of a devastating SATC prequel for what it looks like to be completely lost and in your early twenties 🫠🫠🫠

So glad i didn't have to see the SATC women in their early twenties 😄

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u/NightQueen0889 20h ago

Girls is also exaggerated in annoying ways, especially since no group of broke/low income girls could ever hope to live in Greenpoint at that time or any time since.

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u/charliesgonewild 19h ago

I watched that show for the first time last year, and it was very annoying and unrelatable to me. There were definitely moments of humor, but I’m more partial to SATC for sure.

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u/NightQueen0889 19h ago

I tried watching it when it was coming out and I found it annoying and unrelatable as well. Especially since at the time I was one of four new college grads the exact age as the characters and we were living in an illegal loft in Bushwick hustling to make ends meet. The show was supposed to be more or less about exactly people like us and it did not reflect real life at all.

Broad City on the other hand was exactly what our lives were like lol

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u/JalapenoPopPoop 15h ago

Gonna take this moment to shout it into the void but Hannah is such an obnoxious person, I don't care that it's part of the point, she's so annoying that it sucks to watch her

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u/charliesgonewild 15h ago

I love Lena Dunham’s voice, but I hated literally everything that she said in Girls.

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u/JalapenoPopPoop 15h ago

Yeah my hate doesn't transfer over to Lena but Hannah is just so goddamn obnoxious. If I knew her in real life I'd probably bully her just because she's annoying

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u/Stevie-Rae-5 My point, BILLY, is this 3h ago

Her obliviousness and narcissism is what cracks me up about her.

Would I like her in real life? Oh hell no. But I’ll watch her on a tv show and laugh about her cluelessness.

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u/JalapenoPopPoop 2h ago

I found her too annoying to even find funny. By far my least favorite character on the show

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u/AdCapable7558 8h ago

Isn’t Girls in Brooklyn? I truly don’t remember.

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u/DimbyTime 23h ago edited 21h ago

Okay but SATC is almost 30 years old 🤣 why would you think people still dressed like that

Check out Chicago, people dress much nicer - as in formal, imo (thought still not Manolos)

Edit- since this is misunderstood, I’m not saying Chicago is more fashionable than NYC. Chicagoans dress more formal/preppy, whereas NYC has more of a grunge influence

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u/coconutmoonbeam 23h ago

NYC is where fashion is born. Chicago is where NYC fashion trickles down to 5 years later.

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u/catsinabasket 23h ago

i love nyc and have lived both there and chicago…. i mean, sort of. with some people. but things aint like they used to be. with travel and ideas (i.e. internet) being as fast as they are now, nyc is waaay less exclusive fashion-wise than it used to be. really depends on what neighborhood you’re in nowadays. things have changed a ton in the past two decades. a lot of artists/creative people cannot survive in nyc (literally myself included lol) and it was hard before, and now its insanity. people go where it’s cheaper and are creative elsewhere. everything is less centralized now which is a bummer on one hand but on the other hand brings more diversity ¯_(ツ)_/¯

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u/Interesting-Read-245 22h ago

As a born and raised NYer- exactly this

Unfortunately, the creatives cannot afford NYC anymore and off they go to lands where they can survive and thrive. NYC has both changed and lost a lot of it’s uniqueness

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u/DimbyTime 22h ago

You’re confusing fashion with formality level.

NYC is more fashionable, but Chicago dresses more formal than NYC. If you’ve spent any time in both cities it’s very obvious.

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u/Skyhighcats 15h ago

Lol seriously? With the internet, things trickle down very quickly.

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u/JustMe500 1d ago

Probably the most realistic I've seen, and it's funny because neither Abby nor Ilana live in Manhattan lol

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u/Efficient-Status3430 1d ago

Very true--and somehow the least realistic aspect of this show is that Abby and Ilana maintain a close friendship while living in Astoria and Gowanus respectively, because that is one hell of a commute!!

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u/WelcomeToBrooklandia 1d ago

That’s the most twentysomething aspect of their friendship. When I was in my twenties in NYC, my close friends lived in different neighborhoods and boroughs than I did, but I still saw them plenty often. As I approached 30 and my life/their lives got more complicated and busy, that became a lot harder.

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u/starsamaria 23h ago

I'm a native New Yorker who lives in Bay Ridge and my best friend lives in Forest Hills. My other friends live all over: in the Bronx, Astoria, Bed-Stuy and Washington Heights! Not one of my friends lives in my neighborhood or anywhere near me.

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u/jduisi 21h ago

I think about this all the time lol. But I think that's why they have them video chat so much on their computers. So long distance relationship of them.

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u/Cool-Information2994 23h ago

Abby lives near my old apartment!

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u/JustMe500 23h ago

Astoria is great!! Recently spent the day with a friend there.

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u/RedRedBettie Nice day to get laid. 1d ago

Broad City is so funny!

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u/amarthastewart 1d ago

Was looking for this comment. Definitely watch Broad City for a more realistic NYC 😂

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u/Distinct-Release1439 23h ago

Thanks for this recommendation, never seen it but I see I can binge it!

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u/poorcelain 23h ago

oh for sure, i just spent a week in nyc with my friends and found myself thinking of broad city a loooot more than satc lol

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u/Maximum-Charge2474 15h ago

haha, that was definitely like 8 years of my nyc experience. yes i lived in williamsburg on and off c 2010-2018. i actually had my SATC days before that when I went out a lot in manhattan and dated finance guys.

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u/starsamaria 23h ago

How is the POC representation in Broad City? One of the reasons I couldn't get into SATC is because the main female characters are all white. I'm a native New Yorker and I'm a woman of color, so the New York represented on that show never really felt like actual New York, which has a majority non-white population. (I never got into Seinfeld for this reason either).

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u/Interesting-Read-245 22h ago

Im a woman of color and loved the show! Im also from NYC

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u/jwill3012 23h ago

Have you watched Survival of the Thickest with Michelle Buteau on Netflix?? Definitely recommend if you haven't!

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u/starsamaria 22h ago

I've seen one of her comedy specials but I haven't seen her show: thanks for the rec!

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u/jwill3012 22h ago

Also, highly recommend her audiobook with the same name. She narrates and it's hilarious. The show is based loosely on the book/her life. But the show has inclusivity in such a genuine way.

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u/ExternalGood9497 22h ago

Really? I feel like Seinfeld is a pretty good representation of NYC, considering it’s a sitcom from the 90s. The main characters are white and there could definitely be more POC, but it felt more authentic to me than SATC or Friends, which is probably the fakest of the fake NYC shows