--- title: Friends: The Real Reason Monica's Apartment Is Purple description: After 10 seasons of Friends, it was probably difficult for most fans to picture Monica's apartment painted any other color than purple. canonical: https://time.com/5209157/friends-monica-purple-apartment-reason/ author: Megan McCluskey article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2018-03-21T17:02:54.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:51:32.025Z og:title: The Real Reason Monica's Apartment Was Purple on Friends og:description: The color choice wasn't always set in stone og:url: https://time.com/5209157/friends-monica-purple-apartment-reason/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt4d1162918f8de109/69892b8aab6d7740a86b22b4/friends-apartment.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: Friends - Season 1 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: The Real Reason Monica's Apartment Was Purple on Friends twitter:description: The color choice wasn't always set in stone twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt4d1162918f8de109/69892b8aab6d7740a86b22b4/friends-apartment.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # The Real Reason Monica's Apartment Was Purple on _Friends_  by [Megan McCluskey](https://time.com/author/megan-mccluskey/)  ## Megan McCluskey Staff Writer Mar 21, 2018 5:02 PM UTC  Matt LeBlanc as Joey Tribbiani, Lisa Kudrow as Phoebe Buffay, David Schwimmer as Ross Geller, Matthew Perry as Chandler Bing (front l-r) Courteney Cox as Monica Geller, Jennifer Aniston as Rachel Green in 'Friends' Matt LeBlanc as Joey Tribbiani, Lisa Kudrow as Phoebe Buffay, David Schwimmer as Ross Geller, Matthew Perry as Chandler Bing (front l-r) Courteney Cox as Monica Geller, Jennifer Aniston as Rachel Green in 'Friends'Reisig & Taylor/NBC/NBCU Photo Bank via Getty Images  by [Megan McCluskey](https://time.com/author/megan-mccluskey/)  ## Megan McCluskey Staff Writer Mar 21, 2018 5:02 PM UTC After 10 seasons of [_Friends_](http://time.com/5192289/friends-fan-theories/), it was probably difficult for most fans to picture [Monica’s apartment](http://time.com/4476290/friends-fest-engagement-monica-chandler/) painted any other color than [purple](http://time.com/5195377/google-doodle-william-henry-perkins-purple/). But according to production designer John Shaffner, that unique lilac shade wasn’t always set in stone. While speaking to [_Great Big Story_](https://www.greatbigstory.com/stories/the-man-who-designed-the-set-of-friends), Shaffner revealed that he had to work to convince producers that purple was the right choice for the iconic New York City set—which would house every main character except Ross at some point in the series. “Everybody was really anxious about it,” he said. “Until I painted the little model purple.” Shaffner went on to explain that he was drawn to the attention-grabbing hue because he knew it would draw viewers into the sitcom. “Color is really important in terms of establishing the show identity,” he said. “When you switched to _Friends_, you saw that it was purple and you stayed tuned.” Watch the full video below. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/5209157/friends-monica-purple-apartment-reason/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/5209157/friends-monica-purple-apartment-reason/"},"headline":"The Real Reason Monica's Apartment Was Purple on Friends","datePublished":"2018-03-21T17:02:54.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:51:32.025Z","description":"The color choice wasn't always set in stone","url":"https://time.com/5209157/friends-monica-purple-apartment-reason/","keywords":["Newsfeed","Television","Friends","TV"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt4d1162918f8de109/69892b8aab6d7740a86b22b4/friends-apartment.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Megan McCluskey","jobTitle":"Staff Writer","url":"https://time.com/author/megan-mccluskey/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt4d1162918f8de109/69892b8aab6d7740a86b22b4/friends-apartment.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Friends - Season 1","caption":"Friends - Season 1","creditText":"Reisig & Taylor/NBC/NBCU Photo Bank via Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/5209157/friends-monica-purple-apartment-reason/","name":"The Real Reason Monica's Apartment Was Purple on Friends"}}]}] ```