The influence of fashion on young girls is something that can’t be ignored or understated, and the BRATZ are no exception. As director McNamara states, “Fashion is the special effects of this film. Bernadene did an amazing job at dressing these girls to be at the forefront of fashion.”
The daily rigors of dressing not only a large main cast but the almost 2000 extras that were used during the production was daunting and some days almost overwhelming.
“Dressing all these cliques, that are really sub-cultures of the school, was very challenging,” says costume designer Bernadene Morgan. “We had Goths, punks, cheerleaders, science club, yoga kids, green kids, dinosaur club — they all had to be visually identifiable, each group is using their appearance to say who they are.”
This theme of using clothes as a personal and social statement was echoed throughout the film and became one of the most important elements for each of the BRATZ girls. Yasmin, Jade, Sasha and Cloe each had their own palette of colors; their own unique and identifiable look that encompasses all the elements reflective of today’s eclectic and highly personalized sense of fashion.
The diversity of the characters and their respective backgrounds allowed Morgan a great amount of freedom when it came to selecting their wardrobe — in fact it was a way into understanding who the BRATZ are and where they came from.
As Morgan says, “we wanted to create a reason for the way they dress, make it relevant to their environment and so, their culture, their home life became a point of reference. With Yasmin she comes from a Latin/Jewish family so it makes sense that she can pull off a certain look that embraces her mixed heritage.” Yasmin’s wardrobe was rich in texture and textiles, infusing a breeziness and old world charm with a contemporary flare. Morgan created a look that was “pre-Raphael, old world ethnic, using lots of lace and velvet in various shades of teals, olives, navy and plums,” says Morgan.
For Jade, her clothes needed to reflect the two worlds she struggles with, one world where she dresses to please her conservative parents and one world where once hidden from their view, she “Jade-ifies” outfits to reveal her passion for fashion.
“Jade’s comes from a parent-approved home, a very safe and loving home but a home where she also feels stifled creatively,” says Morgan. “We dressed her in a lot of black which is the complete opposite to the pastel spectrum. Jade’s very edgy where her clothes incorporate a real Asian influence. I’d say Jade’s got a very London street look mixed with Japan’s Lolita Goth look. I had a lot of fun with Jade’s outfits.”
When it came to Sasha, Morgan says that Sasha has a very evolved sense of fashion – what works and what doesn’t. With this character, more than the others Morgan really mixed things up and ended up with very funky, stylized and polished look.
“Sasha comes from money but she’s caught in the middle of a parental war,” explains Morgan. “She’s an affluent latchkey kid and so she bonds with her girlfriends who become her family and sphere of influence. We used a lot of animal prints and that’s her real identifiable statement, we also mixed in high-end metallic items. Sasha has the most confidence and she is very put together.”
“Cloe comes from a single mother family so she doesn’t have money to spend on clothes, she’s very budget-minded,” says Morgan. “For her, denim is the staple in her wardrobe, it’s what we used to ground her. Denim drives our world and you can basically wear it to any occasion. Cloe is also the athletic one so her clothes are fun and we embellished everything with lots of accessories, flashy belt buckles, beading and other kinds of ornamentation. The colors we used for Cloe were very saturated colors like the pinks and turquoises she wears.”
In keeping with Meredith’s strong A-type personality, the wardrobe for Meredith can best be described as an American version of a Sloane Ranger, classic and tailored. According to Morgan, “It’s the merging of old-family money and a conservative, affluent lifestyle. We dressed her in a lot of Lacoste and Marc Jacobs, and I even pulled some Betsy Johnson pieces to reinforce the world that Meredith comes from—she can afford to buy what she wants.”
However Meredith’s preppy look was shed when it came to dressing her for the two big musical numbers that she performs in. In those instances, Morgan drew from the classical Las Vegas reviews a la Ann Margret, where the male backup dancers wore tuxedos and top hats, which brilliantly complemented Meredith decked out in sequin and huge white ostrich feather fans.
With more and more young girls becoming fashion-obsessed, Morgan admits that it’s a fine line between using fashion as a means of self-expression and creativity to that of using clothes as a way to winning acceptance into a group of peers. “I think that for most girls at that tween age, they can be very impressionable and insecure and what you wear or don’t wear becomes what defines you and gains you access to certain cliques,” says Morgan.
Nathalia Ramos adds, “Sure fashion is really important but it’s not everything. It shouldn’t be what defines you as an individual, it’s not what makes you a good person. Fashion is fun and it’s a great way for girls to express themselves and be original but it shouldn’t be the most important thing in the world.’
Logan Browning who plays Sasha feels that having confidence is the real “must-have” fashion accessory. “It’s important to feel good about yourself and that’s where you get your confidence, that’s what gives you that boost to go out and make friends — be personable. Girls should dress in whatever makes you feel good, your style should come from within. But,” Logan says, “the clothes we wear in this film are fantastic and every girl is going to want them.”
“Bernadene is unbelievable!! She has an amazing sense of fashion and is incredibly creative,” says producer Avi Arad. “What she did brilliantly was pull in lots of different clothes and create outfits that kids not only want to wear but are affordable. The sensibility that Bernadene brought to BRATZ was that she wanted to make sure that these kids look amazing but appropriate. Being a grandmother and a mother, it was a very helpful attribute to bring to the table, to be aware of the need to on one hand live up to the BRATZ’s passion for fashion but at the same time make sure this passion is done tastefully.”
“Fashion is and has always been about recycling and regenerating — it’s about redesigning textiles and trends. A great example of that is how it took 25 years to take the grunge/punk look to make it on the runways. Western fashion crossed over to rockabilly, the glamour of the ‘50s and ‘60s is now what we’re seeing on red carpets. Fashion is constantly evolving so it’s no surprise that young people gravitate towards it.”
Some of the designers that Morgan cited she used for the BRATZ stylized look were HYPE Shoes, Betsy Johnson, Freedom for Humanity, Forever 21. McNamara sums up the funky and fabulous BRATZ look. “I think we found the perfect balance of forward-thinking clothes and something that really looks cool, kids and their moms are going to be impressed.
“Fashion is so important,” says McNamara. “I used to go to movies and I’d be paying attention to how the acting was and I’d ask kids afterwards, “What did you think of the film?’ and they’d go ‘Oh… I loved the clothes’. So I learned that I’ve got to make sure the clothes are great —Bernadene certainly delivered that and more.”
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