There's More To The Summer I Turned Pretty's Beach Town Than Meets The Eye
So sorry if you want to visit Cousins.
In The Summer I Turned Pretty, Isabel “Belly” Conklin (Lola Tung) treasures her annual summers at Cousins Beach. For her entire life, she and her family have spent summers at the beach house of their family friends, the Fishers. There are a lot of reasons Belly loves her summers, especially the fact that she gets to spend them with the adorable brothers Conrad Fisher (Christopher Briney) and Jeremiah Fisher (Gavin Casalegno). But one of the other main draws is Cousins Beach itself. The beautiful locale gives Belly a truly picturesque summer, but unfortunately for fans, they’ll have a little trouble visiting the beach themselves, because The Summer I Turned Pretty wasn’t filmed in Cousins... because Cousins doesn’t exist.
The Summer I Turned Pretty, which is based on author Jenny Han’s novel of the same name, makes Cousins Beach seem like the perfect spot for your next vacation, and it probably would be — if only it were real. According to Han, Cousins Beach is a fictional creation inspired by a mix of Cape Cod, the Hamptons, and the Outer Banks. It makes sense that it’s not a real place — there’s just something really idyllic about Cousins Beach that makes it feel a little too good to be true.
Just because Cousins Beach isn’t real, though, it doesn't mean you can’t visit the series’ filming locations. The Summer I Turned Pretty was filmed in and around Wilmington, North Carolina in 2021. Port City Daily reported the series was filmed at Carolina Beach, Fort Fisher, and Transit’s Padgett Station. Wilmington is actually a pretty popular film locale. The area is also being used as a location for George and Tammy, starring Jessica Chastain and Michael Shannon; The Problem with Providence, starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Lily James; and Season 3 of the Starz series Hightown. And of course, with The Summer I Turned Pretty coming back for another season, Wilmington will most likely be playing the role of Cousins Beach once again soon.
Season 1 of The Summer I Turned Pretty is available on Prime Video now.
