Jane Ford and I was the costume designer on the original 2004 movie Mean Girls.

I'm going to break down Katy's transformation through her costume.

What I love about film is it's a puzzle on every little piece is really important.

And so what costume designer does is works very closely with the actors to help them become three character.

Well, the process we're putting together.

The costumes from mean girls was taken what is really So we started with looking at yearbooks and looking at what Children and girls in schools actually did wear.

And there's a tremendous amount of research, and we, you know, sort of allowed ourselves to go into the version of a candy store.

Everything bright and shiny and sweet and delightful is what we chose to illustrate plastics with that the time it was like Paris Hilton and that genre of young women that were, you know, sophisticated.

And I'm spent a lot of money on clothes and thought a lot about what they would wear.

Katie comes into this American high school world, and so if you'll look at what she actually wears through in her transformation, you know she's a simply dressed teenager, and then she lands in this place that's very far into her, with these girls in these personalities and these cliques that are very foreign to her, and so she gradually changes.

It was such a great script, and the dialogue is so amazing that we all would pretty much follow through with the guidance of what was written.

And I don't really recall anything drastically changing.

She gets invited to sit down with these girls, and she doesn't really know what she's been invited to.

D'oh!

So you've actually never been to a real school before.

Shut Regina has on her her power suit.

She has on her high boots, and she's got her collar turned up and her her dark sweater that makes her look like she's the boss and the one in charge.

And Gretchen has her sweater on.

But it's, you know, a little softer with the pattern, and she foregoes the shirt because she doesn't want to be exactly like Regina.

Karen just tries to be a little bit somewhere in between, and she's got her sweater on.

So if you'll look at the two of them, definitely you see that Regina has got the major costume and they both just balance her out.

We want to invite you to have lunch with us every day for the rest of the week.

Oh, it's OK.

Coolness.

So we'll see you tomorrow.

On Wednesdays, we wear pink.

What we really wanted to do, and this is have her costume be completely different from what they would wear.

She has on no earrings, no necklace.

Her shirt is a little bit.

If you'll look.

It's not pressed, and it's not pristine.

If she was plastic, she would have on a little more like that Katie has on jeans, which is not allowed.

Her shirt is not tucked in, which again is not allowed.

And it's just not as form fitting as the other girls.

Oh my God, I love your precinct.

Where did you get it?

Oh, my mom made it from the bracelet is an African tribal bracelet.

She's using what she has so that that's her jewelry, something that's very authentic and wonderful that she had from her former life so fat she Katie's breaking all sorts of rules, but she doesn't even know it.

You can't wear a tank top two days in a row, and you can only wear your hair in a ponytail once a week.

So I guess you picked today in this particular scene.

She has tried toe wear pink on Wednesday and she borrows the shirt from Damian.

Do you have anything pink, hugely oversized, as he is a much bigger person.

But here would be Katie if she wore something that actually fit her.

And she's still got the jeans because again, sort of all.

She has 120 calories and 48 calories from fat.

What percent is that?

So A little bit dramatic within the real move.

The time that this was made graphic T shirts were quite the thing.

And so we wanted to use wth, um, where we could.

And so we're trying to come up with different things that different girls shirts could say and a little bit dramatic just seemed to fit perfectly for Regina George.

Unfortunately, no one told me about the slut rule, so I showed up like this.

At this point in the story.

Katie's been invited to the Halloween party, and she's really excited.

So she's She's starting to feel like that they're really all gonna be great friends.

So in this particular dress actually came from a thrift store because that's where Katie would get a Halloween costume.

And so her mom took it in for her.

So she's things were fitting her a little bit better now.

Still, when you see the other one's completely not there yet.

And then she added the blood herself and did her teeth herself.

And, you know, she put her own veil on, and I wanted it to look as different from the others as it possibly could look.

So in Gretchen's costume, she's completely covered up because that is her conservative way, but you finally see her form fitting shape.

This is literally made out of a heavy duty stretch plastic, which gives her that reflection and that shine and then her tiny little reference to being a cat years.

And it's the same with Karen as a mouse.

Her only reference to being a mouse or the mouse ears, the colors and the textures with all the different reflections, they really are utilizing their plastic style.

This'll point in the story.

Katie's there, she's in the fold, and she is dressing like them wants to become one of them.

And you can see clearly that her parents are terrified by the thought.

Both she and Regina have done the showing the little bit of a tummy, so she's copying.

I really wanted to use plastic so again their skirts are made out of plastic.

Santa Claus would never get away with this.

Also, I wanted it to look like something that they, in theory, could have put together for themselves.

The top was a tank top.

That fringe was added, and then the skirts we had made.

I have a feeling that the boots and probably the gloves came from.

You know, a lot of stuff comes from stripper stores and then, uh, the hats.

I really think I probably got him at Party City because being with the plastics was like being famous.

This is Katie's presenting herself as a plaster and she's got shoes.

She's got the walk.

She's got the short skirt and she's done it.

Katie is now wearing high heeled patent leather shoes.

Toe look just like all the other girls.

She's not wearing tennis shoes like the non plastic trash on so one of the things.

Always when there's a stunt involved is how you know, how can it look and be the way that the costume and the character would want it to be.

Then how can it work for the stunt?

So I needed and wanted something that when she's sticking out of the trash, can almost like tissue paper coming out of a paper bag.

So that's what I was thinking off when I designed this costume.

We needed layers so that she would be protected.

So you have the underneath layer and then adding the tight fitting hoody on top of it and then the skirt for when it sticks out of the trash can.

It's got this roughly layer.

I'm sorry.

I can explain.

Explain how you forgot to invite us to your party.

Well, she has disturbed real friends to have this party, and she's trying to get Aaron Samuels, and she doesn't go to Genesis art opening and chooses to do this instead.

And she bought this dress on her own.

It was a strapless dress, and we decided together Lindsey, now that she wanted something more, and so we decided to add the bra, as at that point in time.

It was a fashion statement, and so then we decided to pick up on that to make it look like Katie's really tried.

You know, she picked up on the earrings, which are the same colors.

The bra strap.

Oh, and the choker.

Yeah, she wanted a necklace Katie did and didn't really have anything.

So that's something she had left over.

It's a leather strap that she pulled off of one of her bracelets.

She took something from her past life and adapted it from her African days him, and have this one of a process.

She's beginning to feel regret, and she's realizing that these were really these air, really.

Her friends.

I had gone from home schooled, jungle freak, too shiny plastic to most hated person in the world to actual human beings.

This is at the end, So it's the next school year, and so she's learned a lot well.

And for this particular scene she's back into jeans, which were, you know, sort of Taboo.

Just wanted her in a simple, simple white light, not patterned, not anything distracting, just almost a teenage version of ethereal in jeans and a T shirt and with these genes.

I mean, what she wore in the beginning with her plaid shirt were just basic.

And so now she's She did learn from the plastics to go shopping and get a few things.

And so she's into her form fitting, slightly flared genes.

And she's got boots on, not tennis shoes, not flip flops she learned and modified.

This is the real Katie because it shows what has happened to her in the past years.

It shows her transformation washed away and she's come back and she's, you know, she's genuine, but she has picked up on a bit, and I think she had to learn that to come back to who she really is.

I'm happy to have, you know, contributed to something that people like to see.

And I think it was also Ariana Grande a who used the costumes from mean girls.

And I think we're all delighted that what we contribute to a story stays and that people still like to see it.

That was notes on the scene from mean girls.