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Bath & Body Works names Zooey Deschanel Holiday Wonder Maker for Season of Wonder, its most ambitious holiday campaign yet
Key Takeaways
Bath & Body Works has launched Season of Wonder, which it calls its most ambitious holiday campaign yet, with Zooey Deschanel as its Holiday Wonder Maker.
The collection brings back Snowflakes & Cashmere, now available as an eau de parfum for the first time, alongside the new Vanilla Cocoa Flurries scent and a teddy bear motif.
Deschanel's picks include the Snowflakes & Cashmere 3-Wick Candle at $25, the Vanilla Cocoa Flurries Fine Fragrance Mist at $18 and the Pure Wonder hand soap at $9.
The campaign went live on 26 October 2026 in Bath & Body Works stores and online across the US and Canada, with selected products also sold through Ulta Beauty and Amazon.
Bath & Body Works has handed its holiday season to Zooey Deschanel, as the fragrance and body care retailer has launched Season of Wonder starring the actress as its Holiday Wonder Maker. The brand describes it as its most ambitious holiday campaign yet and one of its largest media investments, with the film and photography leaning heavily on the soft, nostalgic look that Deschanel has made her own, with pastel backdrops, holiday accessories and iridescent lighting accents throughout.
Deschanel brings her own love of Christmas at home to the role, and in a separate interview about her house she has described decorating with the help of a team, adding that her fiancé "Jonathan's really, really into it."
Bath & Body Works casts Zooey Deschanel in Season of Wonder with Snowflakes & Cashmere and Vanilla Cocoa Flurries
The collection is built around two hero fragrances, starting with the return of Snowflakes & Cashmere, a blend of vanilla cashmere cream, caramel woods and frosted clementine that is available as an eau de parfum for the first time this year. It sits alongside body care, home fragrance, laundry and hand soaps in the same scent, while the season's new arrival, Vanilla Cocoa Flurries, mixes white cocoa, chilled coconut milk and vanilla woods across body care, candles and soaps. A new bubble bath made with vitamin E and aloe joins the holiday assortment too, and home fragrance favourites including Pure Wonder, Moonlit Goddess, Fresh Balsam, Lavender & Pine and Winter return, all dressed in iridescent packaging with a teddy bear motif running through the accessories and décor.
Deschanel has personally chosen a handful of products for the campaign, and her picks include a $25 Snowflakes & Cashmere 3-Wick Candle together with the $18 Vanilla Cocoa Flurries Fine Fragrance Mist and the $9 Pure Wonder Gentle & Clean Foaming Hand Soap. Explaining what the theme means to her, she said "For me, holiday wonder is in the little things you look forward to every year," and elsewhere added that "Fragrance has such a powerful connection to memory." Veronique Gabai-Pinsky, chief brand and product officer at Bath & Body Works, framed the launch in similar terms, saying that "The holidays are a magical time, bringing people together through cherished traditions and moments of joy."
The media plan is among the biggest the brand has ever put behind a campaign, as Season of Wonder runs across YouTube, connected TV, social media and stores along with out of home placements in New York, Los Angeles and Dallas. Deschanel is also sharing the campaign with her own followers on Instagram and TikTok, while press, VIPs and influencers were invited to a launch at a Beverly Hills home on 21 October, and speaking around the launch she admitted that "I feel very nostalgic about Bath & Body Works" and named Moonlit Goddess as her current favourite because "It smells like pears and lavender."
Season of Wonder follows Bath & Body Works' Consumer First Formula and the Hilary Duff Fruit Fusion launch
The fit between star and brand becomes clearer in Deschanel's interview about her family's holiday traditions, where she explained that "Bath & Body Works is pastel, so it actually fits into my holiday aesthetic, in general, and it's nostalgic," and described the brand's 21 October launch event as "very on brand." At home she describes herself and Scott as pastel holiday people who add a vintage twist to their decorations, and on matters of design she insists that "We have never disagreed on anything," although the Christmas tree remains a gentle exception, since she says "I was always a fresh tree person because I love the smell" while Scott prefers a tree that comes back year after year.
Her approach to the season itself also mirrors the idea of a collection built around small daily rituals, because she says "I pretty much like to experience the holidays fully, like an advent calendar style," with a different activity planned for each day of the season. Those activities range from throwing a Christmas party and singing carols with a group to decorating and making Christmas cookies with her children, Charlie and Elsie, and she has said that "My kids love decorating," which places the campaign's candles, soaps and teddy bear décor squarely inside the kind of busy family home that Bath & Body Works wants to reach. It is a picture of Christmas that depends on repetition and anticipation, which suits a retailer whose 3-wick candles promise up to 45 hours of fragrance and whose more than 1,900 stores across the US and Canada are designed to be visited again and again throughout the gifting season.
The campaign also sits within a wider reset at the retailer, which introduced its Consumer First Formula at the end of 2025 with plans to return to product leadership in core categories, reinvest in marketing and reach shoppers through third party channels. Chief executive Daniel Heaf has said he wants to move the company from a specialty retailer to a "premier global brand", and the clearest earlier example arrived on 6 July 2026, when Bath & Body Works launched Fruit Fusion with Hilary Duff as ambassador and creative partner. Gabai-Pinsky described that franchise as "our Consumer First Formula in action", and its media mix of YouTube, connected TV, social, stores and placements in major markets is essentially the blueprint that Season of Wonder has now scaled up for the busiest quarter of the year.
Analysts at Wells Fargo linked the Duff partnership to nostalgia for 1990s and early 2000s culture, and Deschanel's soft, retro styling in Season of Wonder taps into a similar sense of nostalgia, which she acknowledged herself when she described the brand as nostalgic. The arrival on Amazon and in Ulta Beauty adds the third party reach that the strategy promised, so the same candles and mists that fill the brand's own stores can now be found wherever shoppers happen to be buying their Christmas presents.
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