Early 2000s fashion trends are back. Von Dutch hats, that rhinestone Bebe shirt, Juicy Sweatsuits, baggy jeans, etc are all cool again, meaning it’s only a matter of time until the trends of the mid 2000s and late 2000s become chic and stylish again too! Lollllllllllllll, I cringe.
Below you’ll find 15 fashion trends we all wore in the mid-late 2000s, each with a picture of myself rocking the trend. We start in the spring of 2005, when i was a junior in high school, and end in the spring of 2009, when I was a junior in college. Please enjoy this deep dive into my ~style evolution~ or ~lack of style evolution~ in the 2000s. Some of the clothes I would never wear again because they didn’t look good on me in the first place, and others I would never wear again because they were cheap as fuck. We invest now! Let’s not do the Forever 21 thing again, please!
Here are the scary 2000s fashion trends that will be back in style soon… Proceed with caution.
1. Tight polos with a matching headband and matching big ass earrings.
This is a Lacoste polo, which was way too small on me, but I insisted on wearing it… often. FASHION FASHION FASHION. I know polos will be a style staple again soon because I’ve been wearing shirts with collars again. It’s only a matter of time before we’re all rocking logos again to let everyone know how much we paid for our clothes. Sad face.
2. Two polos together with a ~double popped collar~ paired with a ripped denim skirt. And a brown belt purposely showing. And a puka shell necklace.
There’s NO WAY this can become a thing again. This was by far the dumbest thing we ever did. WHY WOULD ANYONE WEAR TWO OF THE SAME SHIRT. Like hello, did we not enjoy BREATHING? Please don’t let this come back.
3. Ribbons in my hair like I really didn’t care (still with the puka shell necklace). This was a paparazzi photo taken of me when I was *spotted* in a hotel at Disney World.
I think my mom took this. But yeah, the ribbon. Help.
4. The ribbon from Victoria’s Secret gift wrapping as a headband.
Another ribbon. I was ribbon obsessed. They were versatile… and free!!
5. The color brown was IT. Also high fashion: Short cardigans with belts worn over the tank top… with jeans featuring some sort of glittery design.
I truly believed this was my most fashionable outfit in the year 2005 or 2006.
6. Halter tops (with matching skinny headbands).
This was a cotton shirt from A&F that I wore ‘out.’ Hmm.
7. Fitted button-downs. Like the kind men wear to work.
Love me a flannel and oversized button-down shirt, but the fitted kind – no thank you. We can do better than bringing this one back right?
8. The going out top! (AKA shirts that fully exposed your boobs with some sort of fun pattern on them usually from Forever 21)
Forever 21 chic in 2007.
9. And dresses that exposed your boobs with no pattern. There were so many BOOBS in the late 2000s. It was literally all about BOOBS.
My boobs don’t do this anymore. They’re divorced now lol.
10. Strapless tops.
I loved this top.
11. T-shirt turtlenecks with long, chunky necklaces. I wore this shirt EVERYWHERE.
The f*cking necklaces—I can’t.
12. The color brown with the color black. Together. Eek.
We LIVED for this color combo in 2008.
13. ‘Color blocking dresses’ from Forever 21 that I thought were maybe kind of too short to be dresses… so two years later I started using them as beach coverups.
The best beach cover ups tbh!!!!!!
14. The color brown still. Like a lottttt a lot of the color brown.
Poo chic.
15. Whatever the fuck this scarf-connected-to-shirt combo is.
I was never sure about this one, but I couldn’t stop buying things from Forever 21. 2009 fashion was WEIRD.
These aren’t the only weird trends we bowed down to from 2005 to 2009. This is just a collection of pictures of myself that I was able to find in the depths of Facebook (but seriously – it is the DEPTHS – you have to scroll down so far to get to those years). There would be more pictures/trends if I could figure out what happened to all those pictures I uploaded onto Community Webshots in high school, so if you have any leads on that, let a girl know.
Other trends included those god awful cropped ‘leggings’ that Abercrombie and Fitch sold that were cropped and had the moose at the bottom of the calf. They came in, like, brown and gray because those were the most happening colors back then.
Another trend: making ‘boob shirts’ not ‘boob shirts’ by throwing a white or black tank top underneath and making a fashion statement with that layered look. You can witness this above actually.
And a trend none of us understand anymore thanks to Lululemon and the comfort that is athleisure: the obsession with sweatpants and patterned pajama pants from the Victoria’s Secret Pink collection.
Times sure have changed, but as fashion continues to head deeper into the 2000s again, times are also the SAME. Let’s all just hope these terrifying trends don’t make a comeback in the next couple years as mid 2000s fashion and late 2000s fashion reemerge on TikTok!!!
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Read: “…if you were middle class and white.”