SHE MAKES MEGAN EVEN FOXIER
Star's svengali stylist spills
Meet the woman behind Megan Fox. Stylist Maeve Reilly has given the actress a serious glow-up, taking her from low-rent to high fashion.
Asked if she feels responsible for Fox’s fashion transformation, Reilly, 34, told The Post: “Yes. I would happily agree.”
In 2020, it had been eight years since Fox made a movie that premiered in theaters. The “Transformers” star was rapidly losing relevancy and, after a messy split with actor hubby Brian Austin Green — complete with social-media criticisms over each other’s parenting — she was laying low.
“I was in hiding for several years of my life and due to unforeseen events, I sort of got dragged back out into the spotlight again” Fox said in a Glamour interview.
The main “unforeseen event” was meeting her now-fiancé, 32-year-old rapper Machine Gun Kelly, né Colson Baker. After Fox posted a selfie with Baker in August 2020, she was suddenly an object of public fascination once again.
There was just one problem: her wardrobe. “She was being photographed every day and she hadn’t thought about clothes in a really long time,” said Reilly, who has also worked with Hailey Bieber, Lori Harvey, The Chainsmokers and Jared Leto, and
has her own loungewear line, The Local Love Club.
Suddenly faced with constant paparazzi and frequent red carpets, Baker — a fashion-week staple who has even walked the runway for Dolce & Gabbana — introduced Fox to Reilly, an old friend.
After all, Baker, who once told GQ he’d spent $50,000 on Rick Owens
tank tops, needed a partner who could keep up with his highly stylized punk-couture look.
Although Reilly doesn’t work with Machine Gun Kelly, she and his stylist, Adam Ballheim, coordinate the couple’s looks. “When one of them is really into a specific outfit and they’re dying to wear it, the other submits,” she revealed.
Before teaming with Reilly, Fox’s Instagram account was a mix of T-shirt-and-beanie selfies, throwbacks from past movie sets and a few professional photos in which she tagged Frederick’s of Hollywood lingerie. Those posts tended to earn several hundred thousand likes.
But the first photo she posted — of Baker and herself, with Fox clad in a snake-print LaQuan Smith set under a Phillip Lim leather jacket — after hiring Reilly nabbed more than 2 million likes.
Since she and Baker got together, Fox’s Instagram follower count has jumped from around 7 million to more than 20 million.
“Fashion is a great way to express yourself. It often has so little to do with the actual clothes, though,” Reilly explained. “Megan has never been happier or more confident, and it shows in her fashion choices.”
Here, Reilly weighs in on some of Fox’s best recent looks:
1 “Good Mourning” Premiere, 2022
“[Megan] talks a lot about how stylists in her early career had tried to force her into a box, saying things like, ‘This is how you’re supposed to look as an actress. You need to tone down the sexy and the makeup,’ ” Reilly explained.
So her goal, especially when collaborating on acting-related events, was to play up the sexiness in a classic way. For the premiere of the movie
“Good Mourning” in May, they chose a glimmering pink gown from Philosophy di Lorenzo Serafini that could’ve worked on a retro bombshell like Raquel Welch.
“I was looking at this dress as the new and authentic version of ‘Megan the actress,’ ” Reilly said. “It is a timeless silhouette, but when you add the pink crystal and Megan’s body it feels super hot.”
2 Billboard Music Awards, 2022
For the 2022 Billboard Music Awards in May, Fox stole the show in a sexy piece by David Koma, coordinating looks with Baker. “[Baker’s stylist] and I often work together as a team to coordinate their looks. They look too good together to not have similar senses of fashion,” Reilly said.
Baker donned a custom Dolce & Gabbana suit with spikes and a turtleneck laden with Swarovski crystals. The team decided that it was his night in his look, so Reilly coordinated Fox in a gown with giant crystallized flowers on the sleeves.
3 ‘Good Mourning’ Event, 2022
“It’s a little over-the-top for an actress, we thought. It seemed more [appropriate] for a pop star,” Reilly said of this feathered turquoise look that Fox donned for a “Good Mourning” event.“We were kind of like ‘f--k it’ . . . She was with her dude, who is always so overthe-top and flamboyant with his looks. It was fun. She wore the look well.”
4 In Los Angeles, 2022
Reilly took a chance with this KNWLS London look, which Fox, on Instagram, jokingly compared to a sofa pattern from the 1980s.
Reilly said, “We tried this look on and I was like, ‘Is this the worst thing I’ve ever seen or is it amazing because no one else would ever wear this?’” She added, “Megan had to add the reference to the granny sofa. She’s really funny. I don’t think people know that, though.”
5 Met Gala, 2021
Fox wore a red-hot Peter Dundas gown to the 2021 Met Gala — but Ciara and Halsey had previously worn similar renditions of the gown, and Reilly didn’t want Fox to be the third. “We wanted to take the dress that already existed and make it fresh and different for Megan,” Reilly said.
“I wanted it to be as elevated and couture-looking as possible.” So, together with Dundas, they made the gown Met-worthy by swapping in beaded fabric for the original silk and jersey versions.
6 MTV VMAs, 2021
For the 2021 MTV Video Music Awards, Fox donned a sheer Mugler dress atop a barely there thong. As for Fox’s immediate reaction to the almost invisible gown? “She definitely was like, ‘WTF, I am so scared of this, but it’s also amazing,’ ” Reilly said.
Before heading out to the VMAs, the stylist attempted to lightly line the dress or swap the underwear for something less revealing, but decided against it.
“We tried to make it a little less naked, but that defeated the purpose of it,” she said. “We always just kept coming back to the dress exactly as it was shown, just totally naked.” Reilly admitted, though, “It definitely took some psyching her up to get her out the door.”