if Jenna Ortega By age 18, she was writing a collection of personal essays peppered with motivational aphorisms like “be spontaneous, don’t be afraid, let go, laugh and act silly.” That A book, which emerged towards the end of her Disney Channel tenure, was an exercise in personal branding that now seems at odds with the actress’ public image. In the two years since release, Ortega has become a staple of the pop horror genre, starring in blockbuster hits A24 slasher and The Addams family spin-offs. She speaks less of “heartbroken patience” and more of performing autopsies on dead lizards, “freak representation,” and her macabre interest in “troubling things.”
Though she’s best known for playing a grumpy and disaffected sociopath, even Ortega’s more venal characters are tempered with health. Maybe that’s why she’s hosting adidas’ first new label in 50 years (adidas Sportswear), which features gothic-inspired black tracksuits with a “You can change the world girl” badge pinned in Etsy lettering. Even the belt-as-tie styling looks like an innocent schoolgirl quirk. From time to time, the fashion industry casts a new protagonist, and Ortega’s appointment as adidas ambassador is perhaps the latest example of her taste-defining cachet. Less than two weeks ago she was placed in the front row Saint Laurent’s AW23 menswear show and her red carpet looks have run the gamut Versace, GucciAnd Valentino.
However, all this access seems to complicate Ortega’s relationship with clothing. “It’s funny,” she says. “I could dress better when I was younger, whereas now I feel like I could stare in my closet and think things over forever.” (It probably didn’t help that she spent a total of four nights at her LA apartment last year “I used to go to school in little plastic heels with feather boas, and I was obsessed with funky socks and sequined vests. Fashion made me feel like my own person.” She wore tutu skirts to awards shows and minnie mouse T-shirts, vans and space buns. “You can look back on everything you did when you were younger as embarrassing,” she says. “But good for her! I felt. I think it’s adorable, I wish I had the same confidence in myself that she does.”
As the first bearer of the new adidas imprint – an amalgamation of it Performance and original offers – Ortega sees her post as ambassador as a kind of homecoming. “I used to play a lot of football and all my uniforms were adidas. I thought it was so cool. When I was younger I was known as the adidas girl on set because I lived in her stuff. All my money went into her clothes.” There’s a moment in the campaign that seems to tie into all of those memories, when Ortega, in a lilac tracksuit, reads from a telenovela script (her first big break was Jane the maiden, finally). “Being on a shoot with them and seeing all the new shoes coming out was really, really surreal. I’ve been sending my mom photos in the dressing room all day like ‘the adidas girl is back’.”
As designers across the fashion industry vie to co-sign Ortega, it’s her affinity for sportswear that feels the most authentic, and she regrets not collaborating with her Virgil Abloh for the same reason. “In my head I kind of thought it might have been a possibility because we have a lot of friends in common. So that was really devastating. Everything he did felt current and contemporary, and he created beautiful and thoughtful pieces. I can’t really compare his work to anyone else’s.” Be it a BrainyQuote Disney tween, a gothic avatar or an Adidas patron, for Ortega fashion is an ongoing process of self-expression. “You gain confidence when you wear the right outfit.”
