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The costume design of Stranger Things blends genuine 1980s designs with references to beloved films and shows from the same period, as well as the rural Indiana setting. The costume designers for Stranger Things were Kimberly Adams and Malgosia Turzanska in the first season, Kim Wilcox in the second season, and Amy Parris in the third and fourth seasons.

Crew[]

  • Kimberly Adams – Costume designer (Season 1)
  • Malgosia Turzanska – Costume designer (Season 1)
  • Kim Wilcox – Costume designer (Season 2)
  • Amy Parris - Costume designer (Seasons 3 and 4)
  • Oksana Nedavniaya – Costume illustrator (uncredited)

Season 1[]

The costume designers for the first season were Kimberly Adams for the first four episodes and Malgosia Turzanska for the remaining four. Adams has been a costume designer on Lizzie McGuire, associate costume designer on the Narnia film trilogy and assistant costume designer on The Ring and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. Turzanska has been a costume designer on Hell or High Water, Ain't Them Bodies Saints and Maggie’s Plan. She got the job through her friend Sarah Hindsgaul, the hair stylist on the series.[1]

It was important to the Duffer Brothers that the characters and setting feel real, so Adams tried to be true to each character. She looked to films, catalogs, magazines, family photo albums and year books for inspiration, to tap into how the characters really lived in 1983. She focused her research on Middle America, where she found that there was a lot of leftover fashion from the 70s due to the recession, among other things.[2] Turzanska looked for inspiration in street photography, candid family images, mail order catalogues like Sears, magazines (Seventeen magazines specifically) and actual period clothing.[1]

Adams put together mood boards with images from her research to distinguish each character's look, including the background characters and extras, who were dressed with the same care as the main characters. Adams said: "They are all part of the sets that create the world being filmed."[3] Oksana Nedavniaya illustrated some of the costumes for Adams.[4]

A stock of period clothing was built to cover the categories of characters they had to dress, including middle school, high school, town folk, agents, government workers and scientists. For the kids' closets, they had multiples of the same costumes to be used for photo doubles and stunts, but also to take into account the rapid growth of the kids over the five months of shooting.[3]

Adams encouraged input from the actors and the characters' closets evolved and became more unique as they merged with the actors. Pieces of clothing were aged according to how long the designer felt the character had owned it. For example, Will's clothing was more aged and hand me down than Mike, who got new clothes for the school year, to reflect the characters' difference in social status.[3]

Mood Boards[]

Mood boards created for the characters and groups by Kimberly Adams, with some of the image sources identified.

Season 2[]

Kim Wilcox, who had costume designed films like Stronger and TV shows like Mr. Robot, came on board as the new costume designer for the second season. Since the season was moving a year later to the fall of 1984, and was also to pay homage to the films released during the timeline, she said to have looked over films for instance, Gremlins, Ghostbusters, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, and The Outsiders for inspiration as well as more authenticity. Ultimately, it was the kids of middle school and high school yearbooks that drove the biggest inspiration.[5]

Netflix offered Kim Wilcox and her team a bigger budget for the season, which gave them the opportunity to create a bigger archive of clothing. She shopped at many local shops in Atlanta and other vintage stores in Little Five Points. The team relied on "heritage brands" that still manufactured the same styles of the '80s, due to the lead kids' tendency for rapid growth in a very quick period of time.[6]

While the kids mostly continued wearing their signature stylish-clothes with some subtle changes to perceive their character maturity, it was Eleven whose clothes required the most alterations. As her story-line had her living sidelined with Hopper, the team had to figure out clothes which he would've brought her because she is "starting to relax and becoming more like a regular little girl". Wilcox also took input from Millie Bobby Brown for her character's punk makeover.[5]

Since the season also coincided with Halloween, the crews wanted an adorable group costume for the boys from Ghostbusters and so Wilcox and her team had to think about whose "costume would be more 'together' and whose would be less", implying Will's relaxed outfit compared to the precise ones of Mike, Dustin and Lucas.[6] Moreover, for the Snow Ball dance sequence, the team had to see what was right and fitting for the boys' personality, because they were just on the edge of becoming adults and it was their first to a lot of such new things. Each of the boys' distinctive looks also hinted to their possible future character trajectory.[5]

Season 3[]

With the third season being set in the summer of 1985, Amy Parris was brought in the team as the new costume designer to search for colorful, bold accessories and outfits that reflected the nostalgia of the mid-80s.[7]

For Eleven's new colorful look, Parris used a mix of vintage shirts and rented pieces, most of which were custom-built. She explained that the era's popular colorful, abstract graphic shirts, styled with suspenders would catch Eleven's attention at the Starcourt, because she'd never worn them before. "It was a chance for her to choose her own look and guide her own fashion sense," Parris added.[7]

Regarding the costumes of the boys, she stated that each of the boys' outfits were selected in such a way to represent their growth and maturity. Mike has got a "little more mature" who wears "more solid polo shirts" and "his outfits are not as juvenile or as young-looking as Will," Parris added. Besides, she provided the reasoning behind Dustin's custom-designed Camp Know Where uniform and trucker hats, "In the '80s, that the so-called 'nerds' gravitated toward Weird Al and his music, so it seemed fitting that Dustin would wear that t-shirt. To complement that, we gave him the cassette tape shirt because he's starting to get into music."[7]

Season 4[]

Since the season had four different settings, Amy Parris made sure to keep track of each separate environments through a color palette. For the teens, Parris used films during that period, such as Tuff Turf (1985) and Just One of the Guys (1985), and yearbooks from both California and the Midwest from between 1984 to 1986 to reflect the fashion during that time. Certain characters were inspired by fashion from John Hughes movies from that era as well; Eden Bingham's wardrobe is derived from Ally Sheedy's character, Allison Reynolds, in The Breakfast Club (1985), while Vickie's wardrobe is derived from Molly Ringwald's characters, Andie Walsh, in Pretty in Pink (1986).

Russia[]

For Russia, the darker and scarier environment was reflected through the Russian guard uniforms. Many of the costumes were sourced from Poland due to shooting taking place in Lithuania. Shawn Levy suggested putting Hopper's nametag, "American" in Cyrillic, on his prison outfit. Parris and her crew had to wear down the outfits to give it its genuine look, adding dirt and scum on it.

For Joyce, the crew built heat warmers within Winona Ryder's jacket since shooting in the cold became intense at times, while still keeping her in a signature "mom-like" coat and her classic Reebok sneakers.

For Murray, most of his outfits were custom-made, and Parris wanted to dress him up extravagantly to contrast with his hermit personality.

Hawkins Lab[]

For Hawkins Lab, Parris put on Eleven's hospital gown and had someone drag her through fake blood to get the smears to look genuine when One drags Eleven through it in "The Massacre at Hawkins Lab".

For Dr. Brenner, since he's mostly portrayed through flashbacks during 1979, Parris made sure to distinguish what period Brenner was portrayed in by making his suits in line with 1970s fashion.

For One, Parris wanted to dress Jamie Campbell Bower in white to give him a perfect yet creepy look.

Hawkins[]

For Hawkins, Parris kept its "dusty, rusty" environment while also keeping its saturated colors.

For Dustin, Parris switched out his Camp Know Where hat for his Thinking Cap hat. For the scantron shirt Dustin wore in "Vecna's Curse", Parris and Gaten Matarazzo envisioned Dustin personally putting the bubbles on it while being bored in class, with Parris using Zelda imagery as inspiration.

For Lucas, Caleb McLaughlin helped Parris design his custom-made jersey, picking #8 in honor of late basketball legend, Kobe Bryant. The Converse sneakers Lucas wears in "The Hellfire Club" were custom-made. Due to Lucas stuck between friend groups, Parris designed his outfits to be a mixture of both nerdy and sporty.

For Max, she was put in baggy, dark, and blue colors to reflect her mourning of Billy.

Nancy's wardrobe was derived from Brooke Shield's look during the 1980s, since Parris wanted to reflect Nancy becoming more serious as she began preparing for college. The outfit Nancy wore in "Dear Billy" was made from scratch, and her boots that she wore from "The Dive" onward were custom made since no current female boots were passable to look like they were from the time period.

Parris used creative licensing to design Steve and Robin's Family Video vests so they could wear their outfits underneath it as opposed to their Scoops Ahoy outfits, and even added little food stains on them.

For Robin, Parris put a pin of a hawk on her vest as an Easter egg for Maya Hawke, while the yellow Ms. pin was a reference to the Gloria Steinem feminism magazine. The Wrangler's jacket Robin wears in "The Monster and the Superhero" had patches personally picked by Maya Hawke for the crew to sew on.

For Erica, since Priah Ferguson had noticeably matured between seasons, Parris wanted to make her look young by giving her more youthful outfits. Parris admitted it was fun to see how the American flag cape Erica wore in "The Hellfire Club" would fit on Priah.

For Eddie, Parris made sure to decorate his vest with pins and patches of bands Eddie would personally listen to. The back of his vest, a Dio The Last in Line T-Shirt sewn onto it, was a personal gift from Ronnie James Dio's ex-wife Wendy, taken from his estate.[8]

The battle outfits Dustin, Nancy, Steve, Robin, and Eddie wear were derived from the film Red Dawn (1984).

California[]

For California, the colors were more sun-soaked, lighter, and pastel.

For Eleven, Parris wanted to make her outfits deliberately mismatched to represent her struggle to fit in among her peers.[9] Many of her outfits are a mixture of hand-me-downs from either Joyce, Jonathan, or Will and feminine clothing she had. For the dress she wore in "Vecna's Curse", the prop department actually threw a milkshake on the dress (while it was on a mannequin) to give it an authentic look, and the milkshake stain on Eleven's dress was genuine. When creating multiples, Parris had ager/dryer Gale paint replica stains on each corresponding dress.

For Will, since Noah Schnapp had noticeably grown during the break from the pandemic, Parris hid his maturity through short sleeve shirts and baggy clothing.

For Jonathan, Parris wanted to put Charlie Heaton in psychedelic patterns to reflect his "4/20 lifestyle" with Argyle.

Parris wanted to reflect Eddie's influence on Mike by putting him in darker clothes and black Converse sneakers. For Mike and Argyle, Parris partnered with Quicksilver to go through archives and look at clothing they made during that time period. Mike's vacation outfit in "Vecna's Curse" and Argyle's outfits in "Vecna's Curse" and "Dear Billy" onward were actually purchasable during the summer of 2022.

For Argyle, Parris wore down custom-made Vans and had her friends' daughters make colored bracelets for Argyle to wear.

Awards[]

Award Category Nominee Result
2017 Costume Designers Guild Award Outstanding Period Television Series Stranger Things, Series – Kimberly Adams, Malgosia Turzanska Nominated
2018 Costume Designers Guild Award Excellence in Period Television Kim Wilcox Nominated

References

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