Friday, September 11, 2009

Project Runway Episode 4: Still Boring!

I don't know what to say. This isn't working. It looks like Michael Kors has jumped ship. And today we were without the venerable Nina Garcia. The challenges are boring. One contestant had the audacity to hope for a challenge that will let them show who they are as a designer. Fuck the heck is he talking about? We've had a challenge where you can design any red carpet dress you want. A challenge where you can design any maternity dress you want. And finally a challenge where you can design any surf look you want. God damn it, make something out of car parts already.

But no. Instead we have designers making clothes for their models. Just this time, the models get to choose what they want. I'm sure the models are lovely people (even the one who left the show for an Arby's commercial), but I don't think they know any more than I do about designing clothes.

The episode was really just an excuse to have every contestant looking into the camera nervously saying that these dresses don't really match their preferred aesthetic. The sad part about that is that the show has been so boring so far that I don't know what anyone's aesthetic is. All of these clothes are running together. Watching Episode 4 yesterday, there was a contestant who I had absolutely no recollection of.

Anyways, the challenge. It turns out that the models kind of have terrible taste. They were all happy with whatever crap was sent their way. The best moment in the episode is when once of the many guest judges rejected a model's affirmation of a horrible garment by reminding her that's why she's not a designer. Good.

Here's the winning dress from Dayton, Ohio's Althea:


There were four people in the room watching this. Harmony, Rusty, and our respective lovers. Unanimous disdain. So of course it won. It looked sloppy. It looked like a sloppy suit with a bubble skirt. It was gross and I hate this season.

One dress in the top-3 that I did like was Epperson's. Epperson was the focus of today's episode because he misses his family and was crying while making his dress. Blah, blah, blah. But I liked his dress!


Now, to be clear, this isn't the prettiest thing in the world. But Epperson has actually shown us an aesthetic that he likes. He rejected his model's request for orange fabric and took her moronic request to look "shiek and edgy" and he made it work in a way that shows his eye for design. I didn't like this on the runway, but the more I let it sink in - especially compared to all of the other dresses - the more I like this.


I'm pretty sure Nicholas's dress was the consensus favorite in the room. It could have fit a little better up top, but design-wise, yes please.

It should be clear by now that Nicholas is in this for the long haul. He, like everyone else in this season of the damned, is playing it too conservatively. But he's got a good eye.

Now, two dresses we hated!


I remarked that this looked like a Chinese finger trap. I also liked the AV Club's review that said this model looked like a stick of gum. The funny thing is, I like the color. Hate everything else.

And our losing dress is from Quacks:


A dress couldn't deserve to lose more than this dress. A boring little black dress that's also poorly constructed and designed? Unforgivable.

By the way, Harmony and I watched a fantastic Lifetime movie last week. We really need to write up a review because I need a change of pace from this boring show. Look for that in the next few days.

2 comments:

Sadako said...

"The best moment in the episode is when once of the many guest judges rejected a model's affirmation of a horrible garment by reminding her that's why she's not a designer. Good."

Actually I thought that was pretty mean. The garment wasn't terrible and if the model had said she hated it, she'd look like she was throwing her designer under a bus...no one's going to want to work with a model who's going to sell out her designer on the runway.

Eugenia said...

Well, I do not actually imagine it may work.