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Daily Mirror
Daily Mirror
Entertainment
Zoe Forsey

Friends: Massive continuity error in Monica's apartment - and it was meant to look very different

Friends fans have spent hours of their lives staring at Monica's grandmother's cosy and completely unaffordable New York apartment.

Most of us were (and let's face it, still are) very jealous of her neat and tidy open plan space with it's mismatch dining table, comfy sofa and cute window seat.

And of course we all know the apartment, which all of the friends lived in at some point (including Ross during the summer he tried to make it as a dancer), was purple - but in the original plan was for the walls to be painted white.

The dedicated team of set designers weren't quite happy with it, so they decided to swap the colours at the last moment - and their reasoning was actually very clever.

We're still very jealous of their NY pad (Warner Bros)

Designer John Shaffner decided he wanted to make the set stand out, so it was instantly recognisable to anyone tuning in.

While white is quite common for TV sets, purple isn't - so he knew it would stick in people's minds.

But he admits his idea didn't go down well with everyone on the team at first.

During an interview with  Great Big Story, he said: "Everybody was really anxious about it, until I painted the little model purple.

"Colour is really important in establishing the show identity.

It's instantly recognisable (Getty)

"And it's paid off, too. You can’t deny that the apartment is one of the first things that comes to mind when reminiscing about the 90s TV show."

But despite watching every single episode countless times, there was on glaringly obvious continuity error that most of us never noticed.

Throughout the ten series the view out of Monica's kitchen window changes dramatically.

Unless the apartment was being teleported around New York City - or adjacent buildings were constantly being built and knocked down - we're guessing this is an error.

Of course, the other possible explanation is that producers changed the scenery in the Los Angeles studio as a little prank to see if viewers would notice.

Let's take a look at all those changes...

Here's Rachel in front of the window

The building outside the kitchen window in Monica Gellar's apartment in TV show Friends changed through the 10 series. Pictured - Building with windows in the pilot episode (NBC)

Don't even get us started on that massive mobile phone. Let's focus on the window - there are buildings clearly visible outside.

But in a later episode it looks like this

The building outside the kitchen window in Monica Gellar's apartment in TV show Friends changed through the 10 series. Pictured - building outside with brick wall (NBC)

Yes, Rachel, we're confused too...

Look at all the bricks

The building outside the kitchen window in Monica Gellar's apartment in TV show Friends changed through the 10 series. Pictured - Brick building outside on the finale episode (NBC)

Sometimes the wall disappears

The building outside the kitchen window in Monica Gellar's apartment in TV show Friends changed through the 10 series. Pictured - Building close to her apartment with windows (NBC)

And the buildings are back.

Giving us a whole different view...

The building outside the kitchen window in Monica Gellar's apartment in TV show Friends changed through the 10 series. Pictured - Building close to her apartment with windows (NBC)

Then they have a totally different wall

The building outside the kitchen window in Monica Gellar's apartment in TV show Friends changed through the 10 series. Pictured - building outside with brick wall (NBC)
The building outside the kitchen window in Monica Gellar's apartment in TV show Friends changed through the 10 series. Pictured - Building far away from her apartment with windows (NBC)

Can they just make their minds up please?

But regardless of the glaring error, or the possibility of the apartment moving around New York - we would still very much like to live there, please.

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