Project Runway Season 13, Episode 12: Wake Me When It's Over

Greetings, Project Runway fans!

Here we are on the cusp of Fashion Week in New York, five designers left. Usually three show on the runway, so conceivably, we could have had a double elimination this week. I would have been totally happy with a double elimination this week, but the judges producers saw fit to drag the drama out for one more episode.

I'm so over it.

This week, our designers hopped into expensive cars and drove around the lower east side of Manhattan to find inspiration. The last time I even attempted to drive around the lower east side of Manhattan, all I saw were construction cones and brake lights. Hardly inspiring.

Before I go much further, we all knew this was going to be a complex challenge. The "street look" would not be the only part of the challenge. There was going to be another twist. Our designers also had to re-do a losing look, with help from the designer of that look. One of those losing designers was Korina, who had just been eliminated the day before. What we see week-to-week is happening to designers day-to-day. Eliminated the day before in a poorly received critique from the judges. Korina's emotions were still quite raw.

Korina is over it, too.

I thought Korina was quite straightforward and honest. She addressed Tim even before the challenge began.

She didn't want to add to whatever drama or tension there already was in the challenge. I'm giving her a pass for her honesty and candor. Who the hell cares about her bad attitude? You try maintaining a good attitude on very little sleep and high stress of getting critiqued day in and day out. Then get back to me. Me? This week, I spent three days with 6th graders on a field trip and the only way I could get through it was to have a good cry every night. I also returned to my regular job at the end of the week and wanted to throttle people at least a handful of times.

What stops me from doing that? More years of professional experience than Korina has likely been alive. Or close to it. Youthful exuberance may be the straw that stirs the drink but maturity is the only thing that keeps a civilized society going. Let's applaud her youthful exuberance. Her maturity will get there soon enough.

Anyway, before we heap any further criticism on her, let's pay tribute to some of Project Runway's worst meltdowns.

"You ruined my f---in' laundry!" - Vincent Libretti

"I hate you Elena!" - Raul Osorio

"$%&#...$%&#....$%&#"- Sandro Masmanidi

I think we need to put Korina's meltdown into a little perspective. No cops needed to be called. No psychologist had to be brought in. It was just a simple matter of letting a designer go. Down a long hallway. Into another room and yet another room. Her exit reminded me of scene in This is Spinal Tap when the band tries to find its way to the stage in Cleveland. Thank you, Bunim-Murray for guaranteeing that any designer who doesn't play be your rules will be humiliated.

Onward.

I think we've all been watching Project Runway long enough to know that when these two-part challenges come along, a designer will excel at one and not the other. That was certainly the case this week.

Sean

Sean was brilliantly inspired by a man in a clean, white caftan.

Seriously, how lower east side is that?

Sean's inspiration piece was equally as brilliant.

The cut-outs, slits, seaming, back flap...this is an updated shirt-dress if there ever was one.

The only quibble I have with it are the sleeves, which I think are too wide to be flattering. with just a little more time on his hands, this could have been absolute perfection. However....

Tim's dreaded Button Bag of Doom left him last, with Sandhya's look from the American Girl challenge. After fooling around with the ruffles for a bit, he decided to go full fringe. It had worked for him before.

Well....this time, not so much.

For starters, you could see that wonky zipper from the other end of the runway. Next, it was a shorts and long-sleeve top combination, perhaps the least versatile garment ever conceived.

She's going to Coachella. Nice try, Sean. We're not buying it. Oh, and the 1986 hair hurts my eyes. Just horrible. It's hard to believe the same guy designed both looks.

Still, that first look was more than enough to catapult him into Fashion Week.  

Kini

Kini can sew. His construction is impeccable. His combinations, however, leave a lot to be desired.

This was just too much. The trench didn't need to be paired up with such a fussy skirt. But had it just been the trench and, say, a simple black dress underneath, the judges might have wondered where the design was. This is a gorgeous trench, indeed.

Heidi looked fantastic in it.  But gorgeous trenches have been around for years. So Kini piled on. Had the competition been more fierce, this could have been his undoing. Lucky for him, he's far and away the best at construction, so his excesses were forgiven.

The re-do of Mitchell's red gown was where the design was.

Mitchell enjoyed working with Kini.

Wow wee, what a transformation.  It's hard to pull off a one-sleeved look in such a chic way, but Kini did it. The simple flap neckline was proportioned perfectly and provided a beautiful frame to the model's neckline.  Even the flared bottom with the wavy horsehair was a nice addition.  Instead of just dragging down the runway, the bottom flared out like a clamshell. Very sophisticated and a definite winner.

Amanda

Amanda went to her blocking and piecing comfort zone this week.  I wasn't so convinced until it walked down the runway.

I think it's just a bit ridiculous for New York. The sides are way too voluminous. The model looks like a color-blocked penguin. Nina is right. Your head would turn if you saw someone dressed like this in New York--partly because you'd be convinced the person wearing it had to be a celebrity or model. No normal woman would wear this.

But this is a design competition, people! We don't have time to be normal. Save the normal for the other guy. Or for your re-do of the losing look.

fade's t-shirts are back!!!!

Amanda chose fade's losing look, but in the end, didn't do that much with it.

She added some leather and changed up the silhouette. It certainly wasn't enough to drag down her first look, so she's solidly in for Fashion Week.

Char

Love you lots, Char, but had I been on the panel this week, I would have been begging and pleading for a double auf.  This was just too much of a missed opportunity.

This was the New York inspiration piece that Char worked on before all the Korina drama. In fact, she did the complex skirt first. There's no excuse here. Her original drawing did not have as many loops AND they were loopier. She even used fabric stabilizer to stiffen the fabric for the loops. Why did they end up flattened against each other? It looks like a growth rather than a fashion statement. There's one defiant loop sticking out next to the model's hand. 

That's it. A skirt with loops and a bustier top.

Char chose Korina's look for the volume of fabric it contained. She ended up using about a yard of it. She bunched it around the waist and hips--two places women want fabric bunched up--right? There were so many poor design choices that resulted in two mediocre looks. I'm disappointed she wasn't booted off.

Emily

Sad that she saved this "awesome mega hoodie" for this challenge.

Sadder still, that she didn't spend more time on it. No, she fell under the spell of some cool face fabric at Mood and spent more time designing the outfit underneath. The outfit underneath was quite clever on its own. I think she should have chosen one or the other...or...if you fall in love with face fabric, find a color palate for the hoodie that compliments it. Otherwise, you have a clever outfit with a ratty hoodie over it. That may be how most women in New York dress on a casual day, but that's not very chic and the judges are looking for chic.

Had Emily put the same attention to detail in the back of the hoodie as she did in the front, she would have been spared...maybe. I was comfortable with a double auf this week. I still don't know why the judges weren't.

What a wasted opportunity. You can go straight to any department store and buy this now. The funny thing is that Emily had originally envisioned one of her "dominatrix" strap designs for the top. That would have worked much better. Perhaps a long skirt also would have worked better as well. It's a shame. I think Emily is a very interesting and edgy designer. She just didn't give us a consistent vision this season.

The social networks exploded after this episode and poor Char was getting skewered. Had the judges been brutally honest and eliminated both Char and Emily, I think no one would have had an issue with the outcome.  Now, we have one designer who has been saved twice from elimination limping into the finals. We'll see how this works out.

Until next time!

Project Runway Season 13 Episode 11: The Yeti's Curse!

Greetings, Project Runway Fans 

and welcome to another edition of.....

Let's 

Make

a Deal!

It's that classic game of choosing a door and hoping you get

a new car!!!!

You don't want to get ZONKED!

We're down to six designers.  They traveled across the Hudson River to the Brooklyn Navy Yard to get the materials for this challenge.

Brooklyn has never looked better!

Tim's button bag identified teams of two designers each.

At this point, I lost total track of the rules for picking the containers. The key rules were that the materials for each designer's look were contained in the storage container and designers could bid on them one at a time.

Each bin had different contents. Every team ended up with more than enough material to make two looks.  It was humorous to see designers focus on one object or another.

Amanda was fixated on a painting of a yeti.

Emily just had to have the chairs.

When the designers returned to the studio, Kini made one fatal move:

He cut the protective plastic off the yeti!

It unleashed PURE HAVOC in the workroom.  The yeti was everywhere....

And mysteriously, Emily begin trimming her chair jacket in YETI FUR!!!

Coincidence?  I think not.  

Tim walked in with an announcement

"Make a third look.  We'll help you out by allowing you to use Mood fabric but you have no extra time."

Wait just one minute. Let's take a closer look at Tim's pocket square.

The YETI!

And who was helping Korina choose fabric at Mood?

The yeti!

And who was helping Korina with her design?

The yeti!

Try as hard as she might...she just....couldn't....shake....THE YETI'S CURSE!

Kini and Amanda

Team Yeti managed to tame the beast.

Kini's soccer ball dress will be one of the iconic looks from this season.

Kini and Amanda tamed the yeti into a jacket and teamed it up with an exuberant skirt made from nearly impossible-to-work-with tablecloths.

Amanda used the Mood fabric for a two-piece outfit trimmed and backed with the yeti.

You could easily see someone like Katy Perry wearing these outfits. They certainly captured the imagination of the judges and the fun that Kini and Amanda had showed through the designs.

The collection wasn't without problems, however. Once Nina instructed the soccer dress model to remove her fuzzy jacket and give it to the model in the pink outfit, all was right with the world. Almost. Not a word about Amanda's wonky pant seaming was mentioned. See what happens when you have fun? The judges overlook all sorts of sins!

Korina and Emily

And if you're not having fun?  The judges notice EVERYTHING.

Nina hated the sweater.  Zac Posen said that "leggings are overdone."

"Bite me, Posen!"

But the judges really unloaded both barrels on Korina's layered outfit.

Let's see....they thought the cape was sloppy, the hat was goofy and the boots weight the outfit down.

All of that was pretty legit. Once the cape was removed from the outfit, a green, leather turtleneck was revealed.

A green, leather turtleneck. Just because you CAN make a green, leather turtleneck doesn't mean you SHOULD.  Then again, without the cape, she could have had enough time to make the green leather top a showpiece and not an afterthought.

Nina also mentioned that Korina "goes for Native American motifs too many times." This sent Korina sputtering in defense. She really only had used a native motif once this season and was criticized for "not showing her point of view." She uses it legitimately, as a Native American.

Patricia Michaels was not criticized for using Native American motifs. 

Nina's critique was TOTALLY out of line and Korina could have respectfully stood up to that. But either she didn't or she did and it was edited out.

Thing is, Korina hasn't dipped much into her ethnic heritage this season. She presents herself as a young, modern designer. Just about everything she puts out on the runway has a modern twist to it. She's not a sentimentalist.

Nina's critique aside, I think a more astute observation would be that Korina knows her technical superiority and uses it as a bludgeon. If she can't out-design the competition, she will try to overpower the judges with technical difficulty. I'm really surprised that guest judge Christian Siriano didn't hone in on that right away. You get no credit for making five, six garments in 24 hours if they aren't impeccable.  And the most technically complicated garment isn't going anywhere if it isn't designed well. The most creative piece in the three-piece look was the cape and the design and fit were awkward.

Sean and Char

The model waddled down the runway, bound at her shins by a lampshade. I thought I saw TWO lampshades in the storage bin. Could they not have been joined to make one larger piece?

Sometimes, the only helpful thing these garments do is give Nina Garcia an opportunity to pontificate on the sorry state of today's fashion.

"I'm sick of the sheer panels everywhere."

On that subject, I suspect Nina speaks for many of us.

Sean did a fantastic job on the FRONT of packing quilt jacket, although I fail to see how impressive mesh pockets are.  The outfit underneath was unremarkable.  But look at it from behind in the next picture.  Why the back peplum?  To me, that's the most ridiculous thing I've ever seen.

Char's jacket was puckery and poorly designed.  The sheer panel made the look more cohesive, but it also ruined the proportions of the outfit.  More skirt and less sheer would have been much better.

I would have had no problems with a Char auffing this week, but Nina couldn't make up her mind and both Char and Korina were sent back to the workroom with their partners, to make another look in an hour using all the leftover fabric from previous challenges.

Char and Korina

Char immediately went for the fabric she used for the "Heidi Goes to the Schmemmys" challenge. Korina just grabbed whatever there was the most of--the most being Kini and Amanda's crappy black tablecloth.  

From the start, Korina's spirit seemed broken by the judge's harsh critique coupled with disbelief that she was competing against a competitor that had been saved from an auf by Tim Gunn. 

On the other hand, Char was energized, focused and produced her best outfit to date. 

Had Char done this outfit for Heidi's challenge, she would have been on the positive side of safe. In reality, it's a solid dress. The cape like thing on the back seems a bit too dramatic for no good reason. I admire Sean's ability to roll the hem on the chiffon fabric in an hour. I just got through sewing a rolled hem on a dress with seven ruffles and a full hem.  It took me days. The color is beautiful, also. Another plus.

You can see very pucker and pull. The dress is shapeless and poorly designed. The yellow piping is barely noticed. The two fabric types do not juxtapose well. I'm not exactly sure I buy Emily's theory that "Korina cannot sew a good dress all full of hate." I just think that she was thrown for such an intellectual loop that quickly spiraled into an emotional loop and her creativity just shut down.

At this stage in the competition, 11 days have gone by and more than 11 people have left. When you come to the runway with what you think is your best technical work and have it skewered by the judges, it's hard to recover.  

So Korina is out, only to be brought back as a helper in a team challenge next week. Looks like, from the previews, that things do not go well.

I don't know how much of Korina's persona is editing or how much is really her. She seems to struggle with likeability. The thing the judges see week after week is that she seems to lack a clear design point-of-view. There's no doubt that Korina is extremely talented and smart. it's just a shame that she melted down in such a public fashion.