I aspire to be Blair Waldorf. I love her sense of style, her grace and her character overall. So when my spring break took me to New York City, I knew that I had to scout out the locations where Gossip Girl was filmed. During a Pinterest search, I found a Gossip Girl themed tour that took us all across New York, where we spotted Blair and Serena’s favorite stores, the two locations of the Constance Billard School for Girls and stopped at the Empire Hotel to look for Chuck Bass.
Caution: there are spoilers ahead.
On the day of the tour, the closest that I got to looking like Blair was ditching my usually Eddie Bauer puffy jacket in favor of a cute coral wool coat. It was cold and snowy, so I wore a pair of Ugg boots (something Blair would never do) and a pair of jeans (Blair wore them once during the entire show, when she met Nate at his suit fitting before cotillion). I swapped a bow headband (from early Blair) for a hat, but looking back, the hat didn't really do much.
After a quick Starbucks run, my best friend and I walked to our first meeting point on the tour: the Lotte New York Palace. We actually ran because we were going to be late, but Blair Waldorf would have made them wait. It was snowing as we boarded the charter bus and took off down Madison Avenue.
During the tour, our guide pointed out some of Serena’s favorite stores, the Missoni where Little J got her sweet sixteen dress, Blair’s favorite stop for macaroons, and the Vera Wang where Blair got her wedding dress fitted.
We passed by the Russian church that was filmed as Constance Billard’s front courtyards and then made a stop at the Museum of the City of New York, which also served as a filming location for Constance Billard. We were able to get off the bus and take photos in front of the museum and act like we were heading to class.
Here's me in front of the Museum of the City of New York.
Then, we headed to the Metropolitan Museum of Art (The Met), where Serena and Blair would grab a quick lunch on the front steps. I was able to grab a photo of myself on the steps, but since it was snowing, I somehow got a snowflake up my nose. Again, Blair wouldn't let that happen to her or even sit on the steps while they were wet, but we were on location, so we had to.
We then went down Museum Mile, spotted both Blair and Tripp Van Der Bilt's apartments, made a stop at Dylan's Candy Bar to indulge our sweet tooths, and then made a stop at the Empire Hotel, where we looked for Chuck Bass.
While we took photos on the couches at the Empire, a mother-daughter pair on our tour told us about how they were staying at the hotel and ordered the "Chuck Bass" from the bar the night before. Turns out its not whiskey, which is Chuck's drink of choice.
After the Empire, our tour guide pointed out duck pond, aka Blair's favorite place to go when she's feeling down. It was frozen over with the winter weather, but I totally understand why she'd love it there.
Our bus took us to two of the most glamorous spots in the show, Bendel's and Harry Winston. It was so exciting seeing the location where Chuck bought Blair's engagement ring and then later returned it on the front steps.
After our quick stop, we ended the tour at the place where Gossip Girl all began: Grand Central Station. I couldn't believe that our three hour tour had ended so quickly and couldn't believe that I was in the same places that Blair, Serena, Nate, Chuck and Dan had all once filmed at.
It truly was a trip to remember and while I strayed away from the Blair Waldorf way, I definitely understood that it's a whole different world on the Upper East Side.
