Recap: Project Runway, Episode 9.3: “Aren’t Models Tall Enough Already? Geesh!”

It’s time again for Project Runway, a meringue of a show featuring kids young and old who come to New York City with nothing more than a dream, a battered sewing machine, and enough smack talk to fill a dump truck.  They dream of making Tim Gunn weep man tears of joy over their chiffons and beading.  So do I, friends.  I just know Tim would adore the way I mix my vintage Goodwill dresses and Ross handbags.  I are très elegant!  Let us see what this wayward group from Central Casting is up to this week, hmmm?

Stilts!

Yup, their models wore stilts.  Yeah, I don’t know either.  I think this is one trend I’ll let pass me by.  I’m afraid of heights, and of looking stupid for no good reason.

Heidi instructed the designers to be eye-catching, imaginative, and larger than life.  But not larger than a sample size, natch.  They had one day and five hundred dollars for the challenge.  May I say I detest the one-day challenges?  Inevitably almost everything is dreck because of the ridic time limit.  And yes, I know it’s supposed to be hard, but whatevs.  I want to see good fashion, dahlings!  Not shit coming apart at the seams!  If I wanted to see cheap and badly constructed I’d be recapping Those Krazy Kardashians.

The best part?  The designers were divided into teams of two!  YAY TEAMS!  Nothing says “clusterfuck of epic shitstormedness” like a team on Project Runway.

Viktor saw a vision of “sexy Queen Victoria.”  His partner Bert sensibly noted that Victoria was in mourning for half her life and, as her name is practically synonymous with “prudish,” she was maybe not the best sexy inspiration.  In fact, she could inspire a fashion line called “Ugh, I Just Got My Period and I Ran Out of Deodorant and the Cat Peed on My Toe and I Have Gas,” she is so unsexy.  We are not amused, Viktor.  We suspect that you have no knowledge of fashion time periods.  We give you side-eye, Viktor.

When Bert pointed out that Viktor was describing Elizabethan clothing, Viktor said, “Well, whatever.”  “WELL, WHATEVER?”

WE NOW INTERRUPT YOUR REGULARLY SCHEDULED BLOG WITH A RANT:

How in the everloving fuck of fuck can you call yourself a fashion designer and have no idea of the freaking difference between Queen Victoria and Queen Elizabeth I?  Their fashion time periods are NAMED after them!  You need to remove your head from your ass, Viktor, before you get poo on your poor model.

AND NOW BACK TO OUR SHOW.

Finally the team got to go to Mood fabrics.  I’ve been to the one in L.A., and it truly is a miracle.  A sad miracle, though.  The fabric I wanted to buy would’ve cost me roughly four million dollars.

Joshua M. and Julie planned to create a “romantic matador stilt walker.”  I’m not sure what’s romantic about matadors, unless the matador’s stilts tripped him/her up and allowed the bull to win.  That would be romantic for the bull, I guess.  If you’re a bull, defeating the asshole in the red cape would totally get you laid, I suspect.  The two designers laughed about gender-swapping after Julie gave Joshua a good, old-fashioned poke.  With her finger.  Oh, Julie!

 

Bert and Viktor did not like each other’s visions at all.  Turns out Bert is way argumentative and kind of a little shit.  Boy, did those editors on Project Runway have me fooled about him during the first episode.   They sure can make a turd sparkle.  They should work for the RNC!  When they showed their garment to Tim, they each blamed the other for it.  Not a good sign.  Tim said their garment needed to be not a “me,” but a “we.”  It’s just too easy to insert a wee-wee joke here, for this dress was piss-poor in every way.

“Hoop skirt plantation girl” was Anthony Ryan and Laura’s vision.  Their fabric was a searing crimson — they take their Scarlett O’Hara very seriously.  I do like that they addressed the model’s safety in all that fabric with the stilts.  Gone on Her Behind we do not want.

Bryce and Fallene went in a tutu direction, which I secretly love.  I’ve never really outgrown the four-year-old-in-ballet-class part of myself (except I have bigger boobs now).  They waved about miles and miles of black tulle and I squeed.  No, I am not ashamed!  But their skirt might be tu tu little, tu tu late, for their bodice and pants were nowhere to be seen.  Fallene, a self-taught seamstress, didn’t understand about how to cut a garment with the grain of the fabric for best results, so the entire thing had to be re-done.  In the end, Bryce made a quick tank top.

Gold lamé was a deal breaker for Becky when Kimberly wanted to add it to their garment.  I don’t see why.  Nothing says “refined,” “elegant,” and “Star Trek” like gold lamé.  People with green hair shouldn’t throw stones at houses with lamé curtains.  Or something.

Anya and Olivier conducted themselves with dignity and grace, so there’s not much to gossip here about.  Except look at this badass jacked that Anya wore.  Persephone, I don’t mind being paid in poof-sleeved coats.

 

The runway show took place outside in Battery Park, probably so that the models wouldn’t get tangled up in the studio lights, which would be unsightly, and possibly electrocutingly.  There was press there!  Not very good press, for I didn’t see any of these clothes on Tumblr in the last week.  Y U NO LEAK PHOTOS???

The judges were Michael “I Never Met a Mean Quip I Didn’t Like” Kors, Nina “I Will Eat Your Heart” Garcia, and Kim “Miss Worded Made Fun of Me in This Very Blog” Kardashian.  (I swear I didn’t know when I wrote that above.  I just like mocking her.)

Joshua and Julie’s matador turned out… interesting.  I confess, I thought the pants were neat.  The blouse was a mess  — Joshua’s bedazzling hand was too liberal, and why does the model look so thick around the middle?

Bert and Viktor’s “whatever” time-period dress was too on point for me: too much costume, not enough fashion.  Even as a costume, it’s community theatre at best.  Kors called it the wallpaper and curtains at a really tacky catering hall.  Old Crappy Buffet.  Bert pushed the whole thing off on Viktor; Viktor tried to share culpability 50/50.  Bottom line, don’t be anywhere near a bus when Bert is around.

What would happen if some 1980s curtains swallowed Don Draper?  This from Anya and Olivier.  Do not want.

And Cecilia and Danielle brought us Betty Draper in her later years.  The only thing missing is a stale ciggie and an addiction to uppers.  This one made the top three.  I think it’s just dumpy and on a smaller scale would never have worked.

Becky and Kimberly ‘s creation is what I think it would look like if Tim Burton’s military took over the world.  I’m okay with that, and with this fun number.  The two pieces worked beautifully together, and you can see how right they got the proportions; it makes some of the others look that much more oddly rendered.  I think they should have won, but they didn’t.

Anthony and Laura took the top prize with their stunning scarlet.   I don’t even mind the figure-skating bodice.

The batshit ballerina outfit from Bryce and Fallene had the potential to be spectacular, but petered out except for the skirt.  It looked like a sensible all-black work outfit from Express procreated with a high-wire circus performer.  And then a red bird died on the baby’s head.

This unfortunate mess sent Fallene packing.

Well, I don’t know about you, fashion fans, but I have yet to see anyone emerge as a star just yet in this season.  I hope they all put on their big girl panties and start to wow us very soon.  Otherwise, I may have to start recapping old episodes of Everybody Loves Raymond, and boy, won’t you be sorry?