In mean girls’ clothing and style are some of the most memorable parts that have continued to stay relevant. Fashion is a big part of the movie we can also see how clothing is used to show the character’s changes. Throughout the movie, we can see the most change in Cady’s style. When Cady is introduced in the movie we see her in how her life used to be in Africa and she is mainly wearing earthy colors. Cady wears brown, green, and red while wearing simple shirts. On her first day of school, she wears a red shirt,  a green jacket with a green jacket, and jeans. Cady wears her hair tied which shows that she is normal and doesn’t stand out.

On the second day, Cady wears the same outfit with the only difference being a blue plaid shirt. This is to highlight she is a very normal girl who doesn’t focus on style. When Regina asks her about how she hasn’t seen her even though she started school it shows that she blends with the crow. When she starts to hang out with the plastic she has to wear pink and she doesn’t even own a clothing item so she borrows a polo from Damian when she meets with the plastics she is matching with them by wearing pink but she still sticks out since she is the only one wearing something that is not fitting. 

Fitting in and Submitting to Peer Pressure

The more Cady spends time with the plastics the more we see her start to dress in clothes that are form-fitting but she is still wearing her colors. She also starts to wear her hair down to fit in with the rest of the plastic. She dresses in more fashionable silhouettes but she still wears sneakers and hoodies. She dresses conservatively compared to what the other plastics regularly wear. We only start to see the major changes in her style when the Halloween party happens. When she decides to wear a scary bride outfit instead of a sexy animal costume or any sexy costume. This is the moment when Regina starts to date Aron making Cady realize that Regina wasn’t as nice as she thought.

After this, we see her start to wear more feminine styles and use different accessories such as ribbons on her hair, these changes show not only how her style is changing but also how she is changing. When she stops wearing her bracelet we can see she is fully committing to be a plastic and gave up her old life. We stop seeing her wear her colors and start wearing blues, pinks, and silver jewelry that imitate what Regina usually wears. Additionally, Cady starts to change the way she acts and starts to imitate all of the plastics with the way she talks and starts to do similar things like the 3-way call with Regina and Gretchen that Regina had done to Cady at the beginning of the movie.

No longer faking the style

When Cady fully commits to being a plastic we see her wearing mini skirts and pastel colors with hop earrings which shows she has completely lost all her sense of self and is just copying the rest of the plastics. This blue outfit is one of my personal favorites that Cady wears because the paid skirt is playful, and girly and the blue color complements Cady. This all comes to a head when Cady has her house party when she is wearing a black dress pointed heels and hoop earrings which show she is now fully replaced by Regina and she loses her friends.

When the burn book comes out Cady realizes she has lost herself and we start to see her again in pants with her colors. We still see that Cady uses accessories and is wearing clothing that is more flattering to her which shows she is using what she learns from her time being a plastic. Although she is wearing her previous colors of green, blue, and red, all of her outfits are more balanced and look more polished than at the beginning of the movie. Cady is the character that made the most change throughout the movie and we can tell how she changed by her clothing. Mean Girls does a wonderful job of showing the characters’ motives, priorities, and sense of self the costume designer Mary Jane Fort did a great job making memorable characters have memorable outfits that greatly depict the characters.

Read more about the style of the Mean Girls and a comparison to the new Mean Girls movie