the princess dress

By: Dorothy Staples

When thinking of a girl, the first thing that comes to mind is a dress. For younger girls especially, it’s a princess dress. As the years since the creation of the dress-up princess costume have passed, the gender stereotypes pushed by the dress have changed to allow more acceptance and versatility in their design and use.

History

Disney princess costumes have been the epitome of girlhood since the year 2000. Girls ages 2-12 years old are able to pick their favorite princesses and dress like them. Young girls are adorned in sparkly dresses with bright colors and little emblems with the princess’s face on them. The dresses were introduced as part of the Disney Princess Franchise designed to look like the original eight princesses and were created by Andy Mooney. She added the princess dresses to increase revenue for her princess line through the Disney company.

The goal of adding the dresses was not only to bring in more customers to buy Disney products, but to have each princess represented by the merchandise. From 2000 to the present day, every girl can play with their favorite Disney toy while wearing a dress that matches the items. While she plays with her princess tea set, she can be sitting at the table dressed as Belle.

The brand has responded to its historical context by adding more variety of dresses with new princesses representing socially appropriate dreams and traits in today’s age. The brand took note that people wanted their little girls to have dreams and aspirations higher than just dressing pretty and finding a prince like Cinderella.They produced dresses that didn’t include a ball gown and sparkles like Raya’s ensemble, which included pants and allowed her to go on her ambitious journey.

This is similar to some of the ideas brought up by Girlhood Studies author Marnina Gonick in her article. She points out that girls often have to fit into a category that is made by society such as the “saviors of our collective future” (Gonick, 2020, p.853). This is all based on how they act and who they idolize. To try and alleviate this problem, the brand added dresses that represented different characters with different values.

The variety of dresses allow girls to decide which character they want to be, and who they want to idolize. If she has many different dresses, a girl demonstrates that she has many idols and derives different values from each of them. Thus, undoing the original context of the princess. The girl no longer has to always be wearing a sparkly ball gown and act demure to be like her favorite princess.. 

Girl’s Culture

The dresses themselves fit into girl’s culture because the first thing you think of when you hear the word “girl” is a dress. What better way to make that idea marketable than by creating a line of dresses that have every little girl’s favorite princess on them? This artifact belongs in a digital exhibit on girl’s culture, because a dress is the root of what people think of when they think of girls. Add princess inspiration to that and it’s the total package. The artifact I chose encompasses the whole girl. From her interests, to her wardrobe, to her idols which can be understood by the dress she chooses to wear.

People should learn the history and politics behind the dresses as it is essential in understanding the changes that have evolved over the years to the brand and the selection of dresses. In 2000, there were a handful of princesses, thus fewer dress options. The choices on the market often represented princesses who had traits expected of a girl from the time period in which she lived. The princesses wore ball gowns and spoke softly. Now, there is more diversity in the dresses because there are more princesses. Some of the newer options include pants instead of skirts for the girls who no longer want to dress like a girly princess who wears only pinks and light blues. Before that could happen, other stores reacted to the boom affect the princess dresses had on girl’s fashion sales.

The research of scholar Jeanne Lorio suggested that once other brands witnessed the popularity of the Disney dress line they all wanted to follow suit. They started producing similar items like skirts and pants with ruffles to keep up with the demand for new princess items. (Lorio, 2019). When more girly girl items hit the shelves to replicate the princess dresses, it boxed girls into the idea that they must wear certain outfits to be a girl, especially if they are in the princess dress demographic.

When girls are being sold the idea to dress like a princess, they are being sold through media and marketing that they have to act like the princess. Scholar K.E Wohlwend discusses how schoolchildren are taught to play pretend with the princess dolls. She includes how children can use whatever storyline they choose while playing, but often feel pressured to keep similar attributes about the princess’s character the same (Wohlwend, 2009). This definitely transfers over to pretend play when wearing princess costumes as they share the same character.

It’s important to note the changes of the Disney Princess Franchise over the years as other fashion brands have tried to replicate the styles in their own clothing lines. By observing how the franchise reacted to trends over the years you see how they adapted to expectations of society.

Girls no longer need to be sweet and dainty, wearing ball gowns. They can instead, wear pants and fight for what they believe in, while still being dressed as a princess. The change has been a beneficial reaction to politics allowing girls to have a broader range of traits embodying their idol from where the brand started.

As for how it is significant to our broader understanding of culture, we see the switch in how girls are expected to act. Our culture originally wanted girls to be sweet, quiet and nurturing. Now, society wants them to rise to their full potential and be more than what the old expectations held for them. This is brought up by Girlhood Studies Scholar Spring Duvall. In her article she discussed how girls can tell when someone is being authentic and can also make their own decisions about who to idolize. “Thus, it remains vital that scholars continue to listen to ordinary girls as they investigate how girl celebrities define and model success, as well as how girl fans both elevate stars and aspire to similar achievements and appropriate or reject some of the characteristics and lifestyles of famous girls.” (Duvall, 2024, p.328). In this case, girls are deciding what princess to idolize and imitate. Although they may be young, they still have a sense of right and wrong and can make decisions as to who they choose to emulate based on the traits that each princess possesses. Our culture has shifted to allow for this within the brand because they want girls to see themselves in their favorite characters. With the addition of newer princesses possessing new ambitions and styles.

Analysis

In a princess dress the girl is empowered to be herself. The artifact contributes to Girlhood Studies because as the study changes so does how the girls play. The authors from

Philosophy of Computer Games explain how dress up play has been studied and has come to be understood. “In its purest form, the childhood engagement in costumed roleplay, ‘dress-up” is clearly a form of open-ended, paidia-style play…” (Fron, Fullerton, Morie, & Pearce, 2007. p.3). “Paidia” is a form of open-end play where children can play with toys however they see fit, without having to follow certain rules like they would if they were playing a video game.

How children play dress-up has evolved over the years with the addition of new characters and costumes. The information retrieved from studying this form of play has also evolved. We have learned through these studies how children play in costumes and have created a name for the play.

This is similar to Girlhood Studies. Since the study is fairly new, scholars are learning about new topics surrounding girls all the time, just like the way designers of the costumes are making new dresses, allowing girls to learn new ways to play.

As for the effect that the dresses have on girls from a societal standpoint, princess dresses cause problems in regards to intersectionality. From the everyday pressure of being a girl, to the social pressure of being a child and easily impressionable. Girls are pressured to dress pretty and have attributes of a girly girl. Society often sees young girls and forces them to act according to preconceived expectations of how they should present themselves.

When a girl shows interest in princess dresses, she is often met with the intersectionality of needing to have the common socially accepted traits of a young girl like being sweet and quiet, and on the other hand dressing like a youthful girly girl in pinks, and sparkles like a princess. Girlhood Studies scholar Marlies Kustatscher touches upon this in her article, saying girls are praised from a young age for being quiet and having softer qualities (Kustatscher, 2020).

Girls are being affected by the intersectionality of being a girl and a child while society decides how they should look and act. A girl can step away from what is normally expected and pushed by intersectionality by picking a dress to wear that is not the norm. She can wear a dress that isn’t bright pink or a ball gown. She could also wear the ball gown princess dress that she loves but portray traits that aren’t normally associated with it, like independence and a love of being messy.

With society having such a big impact on girls from a young age, it often leads to the feeling that girlhood doesn’t need to be studied. To many it feels like girls aren’t forging their own way, but rather doing what they are told by societal standards. With this mindset, girls are undervalued because society doesn’t seem to see the use in studying something that is not unique.

However, the truth is quite the opposite. Girlhood brings up a lot of new ideas and perspectives that may not have been brought to the surface without studying girls themselves. One such example is how play can be so affected by toys and accessories. When playing in a princess dress, girls have full control over how they play, but for some reason as stated earlier,

they feel the need to resort back to some characteristics of the princess’ original story. Could this be true for other elements of play? Research could now be directed towards that because of the study done on girl’s and girlhood during play.

So much goes into the meaning of girlhood. For the dresses especially, when anyone thinks of what a little girl loves, one of the first things to come to mind is a princess. They teach good values, have inspiring stories, and encourage little girl’s to be themselves. Princess dresses are the epitome of girlhood because they represent the girls’ desire to explore through creative play. Cayley Burton discusses this in her article explaining that dresses are a means of expression and an outlet of play for little girls. They empower her to be herself and to play how she sees fit while playing the role of a princess (Burton, 2021).

In conclusion, dresses create the framework for girls to play and discover themselves under the persona of their favorite princess. While that may sometimes hinder creativity, it is also a vital part of girlhood allowing the girl to envision herself as her idol portraying the positive traits the princesses represent through play. It relates to Girlhood Studies through the fact that they are both evolving in information on interests of girls and adapting to make space for new information. The dresses are a truly iconic piece of girlhood that allows for the girl to dream big and be who she wants to be all while still being the young girl she is.

Reference List

Burton C. (2021). "This is a different kingdom": A case study of gender-creative feminine expression during princess play. Heliyon, 7(5), e06994. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.heliyon.2021.e06994

Duvall, Spring (2024). “Celebrity Girls’ Studies: Interdisciplinary Scholarship on Fame, Girlhoods, and Identity.” In Routledge Companion on Girls’ Studies. In Sharon Mazzarrela (Eds) 319-332. New York: Routledge,

Fron, J., Fullerton, T., Morie, J., & Pearce, C. (2007). Playing Dress-Up: Costumes, roleplay and imagination Philosophy of Computer Games. In Philosophy of Computer Games. https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/document?repid=rep1&type=pdf&doi=131d13916ba062717e45efea0 a5e81b4bd372830

Gonick, Marnina (2020). “Girls.” The SAGE Encyclopedia of Children and Childhood Studies, edited by Daniel Thomas Cook,852-855. Sage,

Kustatscher, Marlies (2020). “Gender.” In The SAGE Encyclopedia of Children and Childhood Studies. In Daniel Thomas Cook (Eds) 1–6. Sage

Lorio, Jeanne (2019). “What Disney Says”: Young Girls, Dress, and the Disney Princesses.” The Meanings of Dress, by Kimberly Miller, FAIRCHILD BOOKS, Bloomsbury Publishing Inc, 2019, pp. 257–259, books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=aIuCDwAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PA257&ots=c94sesX ONw&sig=i0Ev0DF_87oaqtr4H12v-lw7-JY. Accessed 17 Apr. 2025.

Wohlwend, K.E. (2009), Damsels in Discourse: Girls Consuming and Producing Identity Texts Through Disney Princess Play. Reading Research Quarterly, 44: 57-83. https://doi.org/10.1598/RRQ.44.1.3