Bye-bye Birdie

Let's keep singing the blues, ladies.

Louise finally showed a little personality with the bird noises and that was all she wrote for her. Let that be a lesson, future contestants: don't show any personality.

As an aside, does it strike anyone else as a little weird that, even though the designers all seem to get along for the most part, at the start of every episode they're all "Oh, so-and-so went home. Any coffee left?" You'll see more emoting at an Asperger's convention.

Show of hands: who else thought these two were a disastrous combination? Nothing about them, from personality to aesthetic, would lead anyone to think they'd make a good team.

And hey, bitchface, how about you discuss your concerns about the pieces with the team leader instead of with everyone else in the room, including the camera man? Way to be a team player there, Pocahontas.

We felt bad for her. She fell into that classic trap: "The judges said I was boring last week, so this week, I'm going to do something CRAZY."

Model: Kojii Helnwein

Well, she succeeded on that front.

Although to be fair, this wasn't all that bad.

Ridiculously basic, but not that bad.

Unlike Nicolas, we have no problem with ruffles (and someone who keeps returning to cheap flammable lace should probably think twice before expressing his disgust). It's just that these ruffles were kind of weird and weirdly placed. Had she or Nicolas come up with a better way to utilize them, it could have saved the dress.

Model: Kalyn Hemphill

On the other hand, we don't know WHAT could have saved this dress. And who picked those shoes?

It's not just that it looks like she has a fungus growing on her; it's that the dress itself is so badly made. Look at her left boob. Why does one cup look about three sizes larger than the other one?

And look at how wrinkly and puckery the rest of it looks. Why did they ever choose that fabric? Despite what the judges said, this doesn't look like a bridesmaid dress to us but we can't deny that that is definitely a bridesmaid dress kind of fabric.

And again, take away the frippery and it could be more basic of a dress. In fact, that was her whole problem: she made two very basic dresses that she tried to tart up with some very bad ideas.

At least it allowed Frau Seal to get her German on. With Nina gone, clearly She and Michael felt they had to step up the bitchiness.

"Nicolas, did you win the last challenge?"

"Yes , Heidi. I did."

"So that means you have immunity. Aren't you lucky that you have immunity?"

"Um...yes."

"Say it, then. Say, "I'm lucky I have immunity."

"I - I'm lucky to have immunity."

"Damn straight. Get off my runway."


Extended Judging:



[Photos: Mike Yarish/myLifetime.com - Video: myLifetime.com - Screencaps: Projectrungay.blogspot.com]


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Girls on the Bottom

Oh, kittens. We're really going to step in it now.

We might as well get this over with, like ripping off a band-aid. Okay, here goes:

We don't think the judges were too hard on Gordana this episode.

*duck*

Are you still there? Are you still yelling at your monitor? Once you're ready to listen, scroll down.

Model: Tara Egan

Here's the thing: we think the judges have been hard on her in previous episodes. We're absolutely in agreement with the seeming majority of our commenters on that point. And while we think the judges had very, shall we say, fluid ideas regarding the criteria for this challenge, we don't think this look works based on any of them.

First, we're going to start with the styling. That hairdo was all kinds of wrong for a flapper look. Way too puffy and big. The thick, heavy eye makeup was a bit too much. Those shoes she put her in are awful. We're sure some flapper at some point wore opera gloves but it's really not the kind of thing one associates with the look. And while we're not entirely sure if the accessories wall contains much in the way of jewelry, the patented flapper look is a lot of long, layered necklaces. Using the left over fringe from the skirt to mimic that really cheapened the look and brought it down to costume shop levels.

Moving on: we'll take the sewers' word for it that this fabric is apparently very difficult to work with. Point for that because the execution on this look is fine; excellent, even.

Except for the glaring uneven-ness of those straps.

And finally, this dress is simply not the right style or silhouette for a flapper look. It's way too fitted. The flapper look was characterized by a relatively loose upper half with a drop waist and a straight skirt. It was meant to make a woman's body look very skinny and angular; all arms and legs.

In the end, it's a decent dress, but no great shakes. And it really didn't work either as a costume for a film or even as an "inspired by" look.

Whew! Done! Still love us? Let's move on to an easier one.

We've been somewhat pleasantly surprised that Louise has shown the ability to work outside her comfort zone and we would have thought that this challenge would be right up her alley, since she specializes in retro clothes that border on costumey. Her first mistake was choosing Film Noir. She clearly didn't have a good concept of what that meant. We would have thought she would run to grab the "period" card out of Tim's hands. She could have done a killer Victorian look, we have no doubt. Before this challenge we also would have thought her capable of a killer flapper look, but as we all saw...

Model: Fatma Dabo

Things didn't quite work out that way. To be fair, it seems that she didn't set out to a flapper-inspired look, but inexplicably wound up with one for a character that should have been inspired by the late '40s and '50s. She could have nailed it with a Mildred Pierce-esque broad shouldered suit or even a Dior New Look-inspired piece.

Instead, she wound up with this. Something that really doesn't belong in any particular era or genre. It has confusion written all over it.

Here's a little quote from her Facebook page:

"Just an FYI about ep. 6: most people don't realize how hard it is. You 2nd guess yourself a lot. As you can see from ep. 6 I had drawn a completely diff. sketch than what my final design ended up as. On our way to Mood, Althea & I were looking at our sketches. I realized we were both doing high-waisted pencil skirts w/ ruffles going down the butt, and blouses tucked in. I was set on this 40's military outfit, but changed it on the way to Mood because I didn't want our outfits looking so similar. I wish I'd stayed w/ my original idea now, because I had a great story for that character & a real direction. Channeling my mind made me lose my train of thought on this challenge."


Even without her backing it up like that, it was easy to guess just from looking at it how much she was second-guessing herself.

It's really not a bad little dress, all things considered.

Take away all the flapper frippery and it's a chic little cocktail dress.

What it is not, unfortunately, is a costume or even a look "inspired by a movie genre." It's just a relatively cute little dress that she tried to tart up in the styling to make it look like more than it is.

Extended Judging:

[Photos: Mike Yarish/myLifetime.com - Videos: myLifetime.com - Screencaps: Projectrungay.blogspot.com]



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Logan + Louise

We're running out of clever titles.

Model: Kojii Helnwein

This actually wasn't too bad.

It's not any sort of technical triumph and from a design point of view, it's pretty basic.

But this has a nice graphic quality to it that works. We just don't like that weird fin off the hem. We get that it mirrors the one on the bust (which we like), but it looks odd on the bottom.

It's a basic middle of the road entry, which is becoming a trend with Logan. He needs to step it up.

This is more good than bad but if he doesn't do something to impress the judges soon, he's looking at an auf. First you weed out the obvious ones, then you weed out the underachievers.

Model: Fatma Dabo

Oh Louise, honey. This is a painful miss, we're afraid to say.

She just bypassed clothing and went straight to costume with this one.

It's just not working for us, poodles. We get when someone's going for whimsy, but this is just clumsy and unfabulous. Those paper tubes on the bust scream grade school craft project.

Plus, it's not fit very well at all in the bodice and the skirt looks like a lamp shade. Big fail on this one, Louise.

Tim Gunn's Workroom Critique:





[Photos: Mike Yarish/myLifetime.com - Videos: myLifetime.com - Screencaps: Projectrungay.blogspot.com]



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Little Dresses with Big Ideas

It's all about the big poofs today!

Model: Fatma Dabo

We'll say this: it's nice to see that Louise can get away from the retro looks when she wants to.


Nice job on all the pin-tucking. It gave the dress a little interest. Without it, the collar would have been overwhelming.

It's a cute little dress. It might be a bit too little a dress for such an over the top collar, but really, that's nitpickery.

Model: Vanessa Fitzgerald

Carrie Bradshaw on steroids. This is a bit much, frankly.

In case you couldn't tell, we're talking about the flower here. It's so big you can't even see the dress underneath it.

Which may just have been deliberate on his part because the dress is way too basic.

In fact, this concludes our critique because we have nothing else to say. But that never stopped us from shooting off our mouths. Strap yourselves in for a rant.

Perhaps it's because we spend more time than is healthy looking at these dresses, but kittens, we are OVER IT. We really want to cheerlead this show because we love it so much but we're deeply disappointed with the season so far. We said this already but it bears repeating: ENOUGH WITH THE "MAKE A PRETTY DRESS" CHALLENGES. All it does is give us 20 minutes of runway looks we could find in any department store. That's not why we watch Project Runway! We watch it for unbridled creativity under tight restrictions! We watch it to see talented people struggle with little in the way of time or materials to make something that shocks, surprises, and delights us! We DON'T watch it to see endless retreads of cocktail dresses and Easter Sunday frocks. ENOUGH, people!

And this isn't so much a criticism of the designers themselves. They all seem to have some talent and some level of creativity. Granted, we think a lot of them have been playing it safe so far, but that's because the show isn't giving them any incentive to NOT play it safe. Frankly, we blame this on the show's setting. We're ready to declare the L.A. background a failure. It's not that there isn't cutting edge fashion in L.A.; it's that the show decided to go the "starlet and stylist" route in the judging and there is NOTHING more boring than a critical response that amounts to no more than "I would/I wouldn't wear/buy that."

Yeah, yeah. We know that they're doing an unconventional materials challenge this week. We have some hope for the future. Of course, the fact that Eva Longoria will be sitting in the judge's chair tends to dash that hope somewhat. We want Nina and Michael along with the leading names in fashion, like DVF, Francisco Costa, Zac Posen, Betsey Johnson, etc, etc. If the show can't get that level of judge because of the L.A. setting, then here's an idea, Bunim/Murray: DON'T SET IT IN L.A. EVER AGAIN.

Rant over. We need an herbal tea and a nap.

Tim Gunn's Workroom Critique:






[Photos: Mike Yarish/myLifetime.com - Videos: myLifetime.com - Screencaps: Projectrungay.blogspot.com]



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