Changing yourself for a girl interested in statues??
How about you just support her interests and stop hounding her about it?
Its like a girl telling you weebs to quit fawning over waifus every day - she wont go far.
Neither will he.
Of course friend zone is basically 99% chance here - but that 1% chance for anything else comes from acceptance, not some quest to transform yourself into her ideal.
Granted - you could say that thats what our current heroine is doing - but its not.
They have accepted and embraced their desired partners interests while at the same time exploring theirs. It is clear that they always shared a common fascination with women's fashion from the start. The change is entirely secondary - less of a conformation and more of a discovery of self once the brainwashing of "normal" is abandoned.
Our characters are discovering and exploring their common interests... while at the same time becoming closer to a romantic level of interest in each other.