Tim looks like he wants to shoot himself with that paintball gun. Honestly, after this episode, I can’t blame him.

The Challenge: The designers are split into two teams and forced to shoot each other with paintballs. Except Blake, who runs and hides so he won’t get his outfit dirty.

The teams have to use their paint-splattered jumpsuits and some supplemental fabrics and paints as the materials for a cohesive six-look mini-collection. Even though the teams are given color identifiers – Red and Blue – we spend the whole episode listening to grown adults refer to them as the “Girls Team” and the “Boys + Merline Team.” Because the producers are so devoid of creativity that their attempt at fostering drama is just a tired old battle of the gender-normative sexes. I’m not sure what was worse – seeing the Red Team devolve into a middle school lunch table, or watching the show gleefully emphasize their dramatics while simultaneously judging the designers for it.

Guest Judges: Kelly Osbourne and Lisa Perry. Kelly got all high and mighty about the “bitchfest” happening on the runway, and the rest of the judges leaped to criticize the Red Team designers for turning on each other on the runway. What a fascinatingly bullshit take on a series of events that the JUDGES THEMSELVES created. Oh, I’m sorry, were the judges expecting silence when they flat-out asked each Red Team designer which of their teammates should go home? How exactly would Kelly or Heidi or Nina have responded to that question without a) avoiding it completely or b) throwing a teammate under the bus? That question has been used throughout reality TV competition for the SOLE PURPOSE of stirring up drama as the judges and audience joyfully watch contestants tear one another apart. The fact that the judges have the nerve to ask such a question, and then lecture the designers for, you know, ANSWERING IT, disturbs me to my core.

I have managed to still love Nina Garcia throughout this show’s epic levels of bullshit, but seeing her tweet garbage like “I wanted to say to ‘Auf wiedersehen’ to almost anyone on that team. Childish behavior” made me furious. How can it be childish to answer the question they were asked, but not childish to ask such a shit-stirring question in the first place? Go ahead and judge the Red Team for failing to work together – that’s more than acceptable. But judging them for playing the game that every reality show contestant and judge in history has played? That’s just the producers manufacturing faux outrage, and I can’t take much more of it.

Boys + Merline Team Blue Team: Blake, Edmond, Jake, Joseph, Merline, & Swapnil

BLAKE PATTERSON

Photo: Lifetime

I guess it’s a good thing Blake was such a fussy little baby that he had to keep his jumpsuit white – it allowed him to create this lovely ombre look. The silhouette isn’t amazingly original, or even particularly well-constructed, but this was overall a surprisingly strong collection. Even the weaker looks were brought up a level by the true cohesion between the designs.

EDMOND NEWTON
Winner

Photo: Lifetime

This was a strong contender, though not my choice for the win. I think Edmond has strong construction skills and a good understanding of what works on a woman’s body, but I don’t find him as creative or original as the judges seem to. Again, what made this look great was the combination of different designers’ skills that went into it. There was no contest as to which team was on top – the Red Team lacked cohesion completely, while the Blue Team had a strong, unified concept right from the start.

JAKE WALL
Top 3

Photo: Lifetime

I’m not sure the cape works, but this little jumpsuit is all kinds of adorable.

JOSEPH CHARLES POLI

Photo: Lifetime

Like everything Joseph makes, it’s a little too traditional to really push any boundaries. I liked that the 1950s had a strong influence on all of their looks, but this doesn’t look like a modern interpretation of a 50s look. It looks like a 60-year-old dress covered in paint.

MERLINE LABISSIERE

Photo: Lifetime

Strange, thought-provoking, and architectural. Merline still needs to use a stronger editing eye on her garments, but she has more ideas than most of her competitors combined.

SWAPNIL SHINDE
Top 3

Photo: Lifetime

The clear winner. Swapnil is extremely talented, with supreme construction skills and a thought-provoking aesthetic. I love this look from head to – well, top of the ankles.

Girls Team Red Team: Amanda, Ashley, Candice, Kelly, Laurie, & Lindsey

AMANDA PERNA
Eliminated

Photo: Lifetime

It’s about damn time Amanda went home. I don’t know how many more weeks I could have listened to her lament that the judges just don’t understand her when she’s NEVER DESIGNED ANYTHING INTERESTING. She made a tent, and deserved to go home for that – and for that alone. Was I humiliated watching her and the rest of the cast of Mean Girls: Except Not At All Funny turn on Ashley, simply because she’s more talented than they are? Yes. But show me a season of Project Runway, or any other reality competition show, where the contestants haven’t teamed up and tried to tear down a competitor who’s clearly ahead of the pack. The fact that it’s all of a sudden bothering the judges that reality TV is mean…  I just can’t suspend my disbelief enough to swallow their bullshit.

ASHLEY NELL TIPTON

Photo: Lifetime

One of the better ones of the group, but that’s not saying much. Ashley was quick to criticize the rest of her group for lacking a concept, but the editing mostly showed her getting picked last, being pissed about that, and not bothering to stand up and say, “hello, fellow idiots, LET’S HAVE A CONCEPT” until it was way too late in the game. Someone on the team actually uttered the words, “I think it’s gonna make sense as it evolves,” which no winning team in the history of Project Runway has ever said. How many more thousands of seasons do we need before the contestants realize that you can’t add cohesion after the fact?

CANDICE CUOCO
Bottom 3

Photo: Lifetime

Yes, this was an interesting concept with a terrible execution. Interesting that the judges would place such a thing in the bottom three, when something they themselves described as an interesting concept with a terrible execution actually WON the last challenge. I hated this dress, but I hate the judges’ inconsistency much more.

KELLY DEMPSEY
Bottom 3

Photo: Lifetime

Awful. I don’t love Kelly SO much that I can’t realize this was a train wreck.

LAURIE UNDERWOOD

Photo: Lifetime

Basic. All the Red Team looks were terrible individually, but when you saw them as a group, the result was far, far more awful than the sum of its parts.

LINDSEY CREEL

Photo: Lifetime

Less terrible than the others, primarily because Lindsey can actually sew. But there’s nothing to write home about here, or anywhere else in this sad sack of a collection.

Judges’ Top 3: Edmond, Swapnil, Jake
Diva’s Top 3: Swapnil, Edmond, Merline
Judges’ Bottom 3: Kelly, Candice, Amanda
Diva’s Bottom 3: Candice, Kelly, Amanda

—
© Democracy Diva, 2015.
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Welcome to another episode of America’s Next Top Panty Designer that Heidi Will Steal From! 

The Challenge: The designers are tasked with creating lingerie inspired by Heidi’s lingerie line, of course, and later, they’re told to design a robe or cover-up to go with it. The winning look will be sold as part of Heidi’s line, which I guess is the excuse for plastering Heidi’s nearly-nude body all over every wall of the workroom. As if this show hasn’t done enough to stoop to America’s Next Top Model‘s level, now we’ve got Heidi going full Tyra all over the place. It’s disgusting. As is Blake, who again seems to think his short-sighted, offensively selfish outlook on the world is simply adorable, as he boasts about being a womenswear fashion designer who understands virtually nothing of women’s undergarments or bodies. What an ignorant little baby. As Zac Posen for once wisely and as always sarcastically said, “good luck.”

And speaking of women’s bodies, has there ever been a more uncomfortable post-runway “up close and personal” with the models’ garments? The judges simply could not keep their hands off the models’ breasts – and not for necessity of explaining something about the bra itself. I sat in full cringe mode the entire time, even as the judges were discussing garments, and not bodies, because the handsiness of the situation was really difficult to watch. Then the judges started remaking about a black model’s butt (which was, it should be noted, the only body part that got special commentary from the judges). Dear fellow white people: PLEASE STOP IT. Even if the models’ bodies were complimented or critiqued equally, and those comments got edited out, this was all-around unpleasant to watch.

Oh, and there was a sleepover on the runway. The producers’ excuses for getting Tim Gunn into increasingly absurd outfits are getting thinner by the week.

Guest Judge: Bella Thorne. She was as useless as a D-list starlet usually is in this situation, though the challenge really just called for a guest judge who would blindly agree with Heidi.

ASHLEY NELL TIPTON
Top 3

Photo: Lifetime

Cute bra; decent panties; fucking adorable robe. I’ll take one of those in every color.

BLAKE PATTERSON
Eliminated

Photo: Lifetime

Truly the worst look in Project Runway history – so much so that I’m actually shocked the judges made the rare sober-minded decision to send Blake home. Also, is the shoe selection on their Bullshit Accessories Wall so limited that Blake AND Ashley AND Swapnil’s models had to wear the same pair of shoes?

CANDICE CUOCO

Photo: Lifetime

Was it this garment that made Tim remark that “if she’s only missing a whip, you’re doing something wrong”? I think so, but either way, what a shockingly narrow-minded view of things. You know my love for Tim is eternal, but sometimes he really shows what a fussy old man he is. For God’s sake, Tim, it’s LINGERIE, not an Oscars gown. Loosen up.

Anyway, I dig the lingerie and hate the robe. That’s another problem with this challenge – it lends itself to almost no creativity whatsoever, at least not the kind that’s visible on a TV screen, when the designers are told to make something that fits into a preexisting, and very limiting, collection. There’s not much to critique besides “that looks terrible” and “I could see someone wearing that.” And of course, even if tons of creativity went into each and every garment, Heidi’s still picking the one that’s cheapest to mass-produce, so this entire episode could not have been more of a waste of time.

EDMOND NEWTON

Photo: Lifetime

Nice color. That’s really all I can say. This was a yawn and a half.

JAKE WALL
Bottom 3

Photo: Lifetime

Jake didn’t know whether he was making lingerie, a swimsuit, or a machine to cut off circulation to a woman’s legs. It wasn’t quite as bad as the judges claimed – nothing even came close to matching the terror Blake put his poor model through – but it was certainly weak.

JOSEPH CHARLES POLI

Photo: Lifetime

The panties don’t fit that well, but I’m a sucker for pretty much any bright color paired with gray. Also, maybe this entire runway show would have made more sense if the women weren’t all wearing heels. I’m not saying they had to be in bunny slippers, but barefoot probably would have made all these women look a lot more at home in UNDERWEAR, for God’s sake. Not that heels have no place in the bedroom, but these shoes seemed to take away from the looks rather than add to them.

KELLY DEMPSEY

By far and away my favorite look of the night. Sporty and modern, strong and chic, with a robe built for an incredibly chic boxer. I’ve suspected for awhile that the judges were just going to ignore Kelly until they pull out some cheap excuse to send her home, but I’m sad she got overlooked for this entry. Particularly when the winning look was, yet again, a crock of shit.

LAURIE UNDERWOOD
Bottom 3

Photo: Lifetime

I’ve started to find Laurie’s personality adorable (well, I did, until she mentioned she finds Blake’s childish behavior “hilarious”), but I can’t say her aesthetic is living up to that. I cringed every time I looked at those panties, knowing we’d be getting more than an eyeful of vulva if the model didn’t have nude undergarments on beneath them. And what is that coverup – a cape? If you’re going to dress up as a sexy superhero, good for you, girl, and your nerdy partner is in for a TREAT, but there are about a billion better ways to do it than this.

LINDSEY CREEL

Not too shabby, considering Lindsey sliced her hand open with scissors and had to leave the workroom for a tetanus shot and a stitch in the middle of the workday. It still looks like she had ten times as much time to create her look as Blake did for his. I think the underwear doesn’t really fall in the right place – it seems to start halfway up the model’s back, and come down to just above the middle of her ass – but I like the colors, and the concept of the sheer panty on top of the thong.

MERLINE LABISSIERE
Winner

Garbage. The photos don’t even do justice to the “held together with spit and a prayer” vibe that this garment displayed on the runway. Everything about it was poorly fit and poorly sewn, and the concept wasn’t as brilliant or architectural as the judges would have us believe. And I don’t even know what that robe is. But, it’s cheaper to mass produce something that doesn’t have an underwire, so this is the garment that won.

SWAPNIL SHINDE
Top 3

Photo: Lifetime

I guess putting Swapnil in the top three fits into the show’s narrative, because that’s the only reason I can see this as a serious contender. I guess it could have slid into my top three above Candice’s look, but I still felt it was quite overpraised. It’s better up-close, but it was still overworked, and all that texture looks extremely unfortunate in photographs. It also felt much more like swimwear than lingerie.

Here’s hoping for a challenge that actually inspires the designers themselves, let alone the audience watching.

Judges’ Top 3: Merline, Swapnil, Ashley
Diva’s Top 3: Kelly, Ashley, Candice
Judges’ Bottom 3: Laurie, Jake, Blake
Diva’s Bottom 3: Jake, Laurie, Blake

—
© Democracy Diva, 2015.
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It’s time for Diva Dumpster Diving!

The Challenge: The contestants go dumpster diving for their unconventional materials – recycled technology – and are given one day to transform the materials into modern fashion. The coked-out editors went a little bit nuts, showing random words on the screen in bright 80s fonts that actually made me concerned I would go blind if I didn’t stop looking at the screen. Also, the designers had to walk back their shopping carts full of tech from God knows where to the workroom. Was that really necessary?

Also, Jake found out his dog died and left the competition. I know Lifetime was heavy-handed with the emotional manipulation, but I totally teared up. I’m a sucker like that.

Guest Judges: A Marie Claire editor and maybe also Paula Patton? Sorry, I couldn’t really bring myself to pay attention to either one of them.

ASHLEY NELL TIPTON
Top 3

Photo: Lifetime

Another strong entry from Ashley. She still hasn’t shown much in the way of versatility in her silhouettes, but the real genius of this piece was the print. She manipulated Polaroids to make the images bleed, and the resulting textile was absolutely fantastic. Furthermore, the dress was incredibly wearable, and the pockets were a delightful surprise. I wouldn’t have given her the win, because using Polaroid photos is just a little less risky than using, say, aluminum duct tubing. They already did the Hallmark challenge, so using thick paper as a material was just a teensy bit on the safe side, but I’d wear the resulting look in a heartbeat.

CANDICE CUOCO

Photo: Lifetime

Candice should maybe spend a little more time working on her designs, and a little less time shit-talking every single other designer for the cameras. This started off looking like an homage to one of my favorite unconventional challenge looks of all time  – Jillian Lewis’s twizzler bodice – but the result was stiff and awkward. Her model could barely move, and it probably wasn’t a great idea to do obvious white boob-markers without making them actually fall in the right place.

EDMOND NEWTON
Top 3

Photo: Lifetime

Overworked, overdesigned, and overrated. And I think the back is hideous. The judges even admitted that it was kind of falling apart up close, but then told Edmond at the end of the episode that his piece looked great from every angle. I am not falling for that bullshit, judges.

JOSEPH CHARLES POLI
Eliminated

Photo: Lifetime

A boring idea, poorly executed. A fair candidate for elimination, but honestly, I don’t think this was worse than Laurie’s entry, which was an even less interesting idea, and far more terribly constructed.

KELLY DEMPSEY
Winner

Photo: Lifetime

YAAAAAAS, KELLY FROM THE DELI! My girl finally won her a challenge, and more importantly, she deserved it. This looks like it’s from the Chanel Fall 2075 collection – you know, the one cryogenically-frozen Karl Lagerfeld held during the first Moon Fashion Week. The silhouette is simple, but simplicity was what Kelly needed in this challenge to show the judges she was more than the funny Boston deli girl. Her aluminum duct tubing stood out from the crowd of mouse pads and wires, and in a sea of manipulative editing and pandering to the cameras, Kelly had actual, real human emotions. And also didn’t know what the fuck Tim was talking about when he mentioned “paillettes.” Kelly, if you’re looking for a loud-mouthed five-foot-tall Jewish best friend, call me.

LAURIE UNDERWOOD

Photo: Lifetime

This was worthy of the auf. Sorry, Laurie, but your slapdash paint job didn’t transform the fact that you just tacked a bunch of mousepads on top of each other. She didn’t push herself to use a more difficult material, and she couldn’t even execute the fabric-like material she chose.

LINDSEY CREEL
Bottom 3

Photo: Lifetime

Props to Lindsey – the top of this, made out of computer keys, is pretty extraordinary. The skirt is not my favorite, but I’d still have thrown this into the top three over Edmond’s overworked LBD. Lindsey managed to have a hard/soft juxtaposition that felt very authentic and appropriate for the challenge, even if the skirt looks like a bit of an afterthought.

MERLINE LABISSIERE

Photo: Lifetime

A McQueen rip-off that’s falling apart, one wire at a time.

SWAPNIL SHINDE
Bottom 3

Photo: Lifetime

It was obvious Swapnil was going to be in the bottom as soon as they showed him smoking. Since Mad Men ended, is it even legal to show smoking on TV anymore? Yes, Swapnil’s broad declarations that he was only half-trying at every challenge were extremely obnoxious, but the heavy-handed “bad guy” editing was even more annoying. He might have a focus and/or work ethic problem, and he’s certainly got too much ego. But constant smoke breaks never seemed to bother the judges/producers back in Season 1, when winner Jay McCarroll and his fellow designers were shown doing the exact same thing on a regular basis.

Anyway, Swapnil basically cheated by using muslin for the skirt – I’d put him in the bottom three for that alone – and his wiry bodice was kind of all over the place. Here’s hoping he can stop the braggadocio bullshit and show us what he can really do.

Judges’ Top 3: Kelly, Edmond, Ashley
Diva’s Top 3: Kelly, Ashley, Lindsey
Judges’ Bottom 3: Swapnil, Lindsey, Joseph
Diva’s Bottom 3: Swapnil, Joseph, Laurie

—
© Democracy Diva, 2015.
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If Coco Rocha releases a book of photos of herself that has no words, is she really an author? And more philosophical questions brought to you by Project Runway. 

The Challenge: The designers went to see the Broadway musical Finding Neverland and created pretty much whatever they wanted from that inspiration. It was an insanely broad challenge that would allow the judges maximum manipulation powers to make up criteria as they went along (as if that’s different from their usual routine). They didn’t have to use photos or point to a particular inspiration, so you could just make whatever you wanted it and find a link to Peter Pan and call it a day. But it was fun to see Kelly describe her first Broadway experience as “like the movies, but in 3D.” God bless.

Guest Judge: Coco Rocha, who they kept billing as “model and author.” That’s a bit rich, since the only book by her I can find is just photos of her posing. It may well be brilliant, because she’s a truly fantastic supermodel, but… “author”? Call her an artist! Call her queen of the fashion universe! But maybe your book should have to have actual words in it before you qualify as an “author.”

ASHLEY NELL TIPTON
Bottom 3

Photo: Lifetime

I feel like this same piece of ombre fabric gets purchased at Mood by a PR designer every other season. My brain might be lying to me, but it just felt very Project Runway to me. Also, this was a construction nightmare. Ashley bit off way more skirt than she could sew, and the result was sloppy, ill-fitting, and droopy.

CANDICE CUOCO
Winner

Photo: Lifetime

Spooky and romantic, with a little bit of a Christian Siriano finale collection vibe to it, in that “stepped out of an 18th century painting” kind of way. Candice’s ideas were strong, as was her construction, and the styling raised it to a runway level. She clearly deserved the win.

EDMOND NEWTON
Top 3

Photo: Lifetime

The top was sexy, and the pants were well-fit. I didn’t hate the purple mushroom cloud jacket – I thought the relatively simple clothes underneath needed something a little fantastical. He just barely slid into my top three above Merline and Kelly, but mostly because this felt like a complete vision, from topknot to toes.

KELLY DEMPSEY
Top 3

Photo: Lifetime

Kelly made a truly brilliant fabric choice, but I’m not sure she did enough beyond that to qualify her for the top three. This is by far my favorite textile on the runway – maybe my favorite this season – but I can’t help but dislike the minidress underneath. Partly because I think the trend of minidresses under sheer gowns has been done to death (actually, I hated that trend when it was new, too), and partly because the seam down the center of this one offended me to my core. I think she got a lot of points for the fabric, and bonus points for the gloves, but the rest of the look didn’t satisfy me.

LAURIE UNDERWOOD
Bottom 3

Photo: Lifetime

It is complete and utter bullshit that Laurie is still in this competition. She hasn’t made anything worthy of my top three (except a look that was partly designed by Swapnil), and she’s offered some truly terrible garments in the past few episodes. The weirdly square pasties over the model’s nipples were in full view, her ass cheeks were hanging out, and from the back, she looks like a stripper Snuffleupagus. What a joke, to keep someone in the competition after an entry like this.

LINDSEY CREEL
Eliminated

Photo: Lifetime

Yes, this has its construction and fit issues. I’m not saying Lindsey is the next Coco Chanel, but in terms of design skills, she has her shit together way more than Laurie. This was definitely not doing the model’s body any favors, but it was also not nearly the disaster the judges made it out to be. Lindsey had known for a long time that the judges just didn’t “get” her. I hope she knows that in the long run, that’s probably a good thing. After all, most of her prospective clients probably can’t afford the millions of dollars of drugs the judges need to be on in order to reach their insane, arbitrary decisions.

MERLINE LABISSIERE

Photo: Lifetime

I HATE that the shoulders are uneven – it’s actually making me unable to focus on the things I do like – and I think the place she chose to start the fabric in back is very awkward. I don’t even really understand how the underlay is staying on her body. But this was actually a lovely, interesting concept. Merline’s head is so far in the clouds that she can never really bring any of her ideas to life in a neatly-executed way, but she’s definitely got a creative mind. She’s absolutely being kept on the show for her annoying antics, and not her mind, because that’s how this program works, but at least there’s someone with ideas in this cast.

SWAPNIL SHINDE

Photo: Lifetime

Sculptural and soft, identifiably Swapnil, and maybe even a little bit unique. I’d like to burn the exposed zipper in a fire, but it’s still a shame this was omitted from the top three. I guess we’re still punishing Swapnil for last week’s obnoxious behavior? Or the judges are slowly pushing him down to the bottom so they can redeem him again in a couple of episodes. Like we’ve never seen that reality TV plotline before.

Judges’ Top 3: Candice, Kelly, Edmond
Diva’s Top 3: Candice, Swapnil, Edmond
Judges’ Bottom 3: Ashley, Laurie, Lindsey
Diva’s Bottom 3: Lindsey, Ashley, Laurie

—
© Democracy Diva, 2015.
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Beware: there’s a rant ahead. 

The Challenge: Hoooo, boy. How many times – in this episode and in dozens more – have we heard Tim or the judges say that this is a design competition, a runway fashion competition, not a seamstress contest, in order to steer the contestants away from making the most basic garments possible? A score? A hundred? A million?

Someone please explain to me how, after all that insistence that this show is about DESIGN, there could be a challenge that so blatantly rewards the least creative designer. The designers were tasked with creating a look to be reproduced and sold by JustFab. (Apparently, JustFab sells clothing, and not just the tacky accessories that appear on this show? Who knew.) I know these challenges have been done before, but this one felt particularly hypocritical, with the JustFab guest judge praising only the garments that she’s seen a million times before, because she already knows they can sell, while the regular judges pretend this is still about design, except when they arbitrarily decide it isn’t. No wonder the judges couldn’t agree on a top or bottom three – the constraints of the challenge were completely contradictory. The judges couldn’t figure out how to keep pretending that design skills matter, when the items most likely to sell on JustFab are the most basic items.

And this isn’t to say that fashion shouldn’t consider the consumer and what works for them. Of COURSE a good designer knows what their client wants, how to dress their body, etc. But keeping the customer in mind is one thing, and designing for a least-common-denominator website that openly admits their desire for the cheapest, most simplistic, easiest-to-reproduce garments WHILE PROCLAIMING OUT LOUD THAT THIS IS A DESIGN COMPETITION is quite another. Here’s a thought: have the designers create things with a specific client in mind, and then announce after the runway show that the winner’s look will be sold by JustFab. That way, the website can dumb down the design to something cheap enough to reproduce, and we can all still watch a runway show that is actually about design.

I can’t pick a top three or bottom three either. Because if I pick the winner as the person who most closely followed the challenge, I’d be rewarding a total lack of originality, creativity, and design skills. And if I picked the most interesting design as the win, that wouldn’t really fit the constraints of the challenge. So I’m opting out of my usual top/bottom assessment. Because a challenge like this has no place in a so-called design competition.

Guest Judges: Ciara, and that JustFab lady who creamed her pants over all the most boring items on the runway.

ASHLEY NELL TIPTON

Photo: Lifetime

Ashley’s JustFab-forced “category” was Girl Next Door. Don’t worry, all the other categories (Bombshell, Trendsetter, Modern Classic, and Femme Nouveau) were just vague enough so that the designers could still make basically whatever they wanted – as long as it was cheap enough to be reproduced. To me, this looked about as cheap as can be. The top and skirt are an American Apparel-looking knock-off of every twinset Taylor Swift has worn this year. And I had to laugh at Ashley’s assertion that her jacket looks like leather – it read as “plastic” to me.

Actually, Ashley bothered me all episode, starting with her questionable belief that a girl next door wouldn’t wear a motorcycle jacket. Is it 1955 already? She doesn’t make much more than A-line dresses and circle skirts, and she was vocal in her desire to make something as basic as possible. Again, I’m running into the problem where I can’t critique her for wanting to be basic, because only something basic can win this challenge. Sigh.

CANDICE CUOCO

Photo: Lifetime

Candice was pretty obnoxious in this episode too, insisting that her win last week “humbled” her while still shit-talking her competitors. She also dramatized the hell out of the fact that she got to choose each designer’s style category – sorry, Candice, but you actually do not, as you claimed, have the fate of the designers in your hands. As for the clothes: I wanted to rip the tacked-on addition off that skirt. And I still don’t understand what that lapel/scarf/collar/vertical belt is. If she’s a trendsetter, I’m going to have to stay away from trends for awhile.

EDMOND NEWTON
Winner

Photo: Lifetime

Yes, this fit the constraints of the challenge, in that we all know it can sell, because it’s already been sold a million times before. Though I’m not exactly sure where a B-cup or higher is supposed to fit in this thing, since the bustline came out ABOVE the model’s tits. More than anything else, this dress makes me realize that Project Runway has been on television for ten years. And Heidi’s personal style, which was never particularly high fashion or design-oriented, hasn’t grown up over the years. She’s still as in love with extraordinarily basic tight, short dresses as she ever was, but after a decade, it is so exhausting. As was Zac’s proclamation that “it might not be my favorite design, but for this challenge, it’s gold,” which basically proves my point that the show is flat-out lying about being a design competition.

KELLY DEMPSEY

Photo: Lifetime

I think the horizontal stripes should have been vertical or diagonal – it’s REALLY tough to wear that stripe on your thighs, especially just ONE thigh, because it makes your legs look uneven. And I’d gladly throw those shoes in the nearest trash can. But I thought this was trend-setting, as per Kelly’s category, and I can absolutely envision the 20-year-old who would wear this. While I don’t disagree with the “you murdered Cookie Monster” comment regarding the vest, I don’t actually think it’s a bad thing. I’ve certainly used similar comments before, but this particular Muppet pelt felt funky and youthful to me. But I knew Nina would hate it, because she does get a little pearl-clutchy when it comes to things that women who still buy fashion magazines (read: mostly not young women) would never wear. Which makes sense for a Marie Claire editor, but it can get frustrating when Nina refuses to see the value in things that non-Marie Claire readers would wear. And I knew Zac would hate it, because he’s so fussy that, as Tom and Lorenzo like to say, he’s always dressed up like it’s his bar mitzvah.

LAURIE UNDERWOOD
Eliminated

Photo: Lifetime

I couldn’t tell this from TV or photos, but apparently, you could see the model’s pasties through Laurie’s top AGAIN. Girl, you cannot make that mistake in two consecutive challenges. That is just plain stupid. Even though this was a clear bottom-of-the-barrel entry, I have to laugh at the judges for eliminating Laurie for her lack of innovation, while awarding Edmond the win for his … lack of innovation.

MERLINE LABISSIERE

Photo: Lifetime

Construction-wise, this was a real mess. I have stubbornly, slowly grown to appreciate Merline’s insanely creative mind. And I just can’t hate someone who looks at how little time she has left and says out loud, “I don’t trust you, clock.”  That shit was really funny to me. But Merline always bites off more than she can chew, and this time, I think she choked on it. And while this definitely contained way more design than anything else on the runway, it still felt like a half-finished Prabal Gurung dress to me. Though in Merline’s defense, that JustFab lady sounded nuts when she said that Merline making this dress for the Femme Nouveau category would “not be honest and true to our members.” What does that even mean?

SWAPNIL SHINDE

Photo: Lifetime

Someone please explain to me why the model was wearing a potato sack over this gown. And while you’re at it, defend Heidi’s statement that a real person could wear this gown with flip flops. IT HAS A TRAIN. Or at least a pool of fabric that you’d trip all over in flip flops. And even if it didn’t, you can only wear leopard-print gowns with flip flops in South Beach, which barely even counts as the real world.

Judges’ Winner: Edmond
Diva’s Winner: Anyone at Lifetime who had the courage to say, “uh, are we sure we want to talk about how this is a design competition in an episode where we’re vocal about the fact that we’re giving the win to the most simplistic design?” And then was probably fired as a result.
Judges’ Loser: Laurie
Diva’s Loser: Project Runway.

—
© Democracy Diva, 2015.
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TIM GUNN HAS SNAPPED. 

The Challenge: It all started off just fine, with a two-day challenge in which the designers had to make over a “real woman” – a woman on the Project Runway crew. I loved this idea at first – techie girls hamming it up in front of the camera, how fun! – but it meant the clients already knew a lot about their designers’ skills and based their desires on that. And I always hate the producer manipulation when the button bag doesn’t make its appearance – of course Tim paired the plus-size woman with Ashley and the “difficult” (read: instructed by producers to bring some drama) one with Swapnil.

Swapnil decided his client was a “bombshell” and never looked back – or bothered to listen to her much at all. He made some critical mistake – standing around doing nothing while waiting for Tim, having nothing for his client to try on, ignoring the client – and Tim Gunn ABSOLUTELY LOST IT, demanding to know why Swapnil even wants to be here. Here, a gif is worth a thousand words:

And the audience reacted thusly:

Did Tim lose control in an unprofessional way? Yes. Absolutely. But I think this was the problem with casting the crew members as a client – those are Tim’s coworkers. They’ve probably been with him much longer than any Project Runway contestant ever has. This was Swapnil coming into Tim’s house and fucking with one of his own. I think Tim was sensitive to that, and Swapnil was not, and then Tim’s brain exploded.

Guest Judges: Two Unreal stars who I couldn’t pick out of a police lineup if my life depended on it.

ASHLEY NELL TIPTON
Bottom 3
Client: Nicole Plascencia, challenge assistant

Photo: Lifetime

It’s a good thing Tim Gunn cursed – TWICE – in this episode, because the fashion is barely worth discussing. This print was awful, and this silhouette is pretty much all Ashley does. Also: I know we’ve discussed this before, but peplums are so the new exposed zippers in terms of Project Runway trends that have gone on for years and need to finally die.

CANDICE CUOCO
Bottom 3
Client: Monique Stout, model wrangler

Photo: Lifetime

I love the job title “model wrangler.” What a fabulous thing to have on your resume. Unfortunately, the “Sexy Witch” Halloween costume Candice dressed her in was somewhat less fabulous.

EDMOND NEWTON
Top 3
Client: Desiree Ortiz, sound mixer

Photo: Lifetime

Edmond really listened to his client – he made her a fucking raincoat, for God’s sake – but the clothes didn’t really work with the coat at all.

KELLY DEMPSEY
Winner
Client: Ashleigh Hocking, talent manager

Photo: Lifetime

I’ll forgive the lack of a button bag just this once, because the producers were right to pair Kelly with the overalls-wearing Boston girl. Kelly never quite managed to remove the “ten foot tall vulva” problem, but otherwise, this was a very adorable, client-centric transformation that still read as Kelly’s work. I’m not saying it’s the most brilliant design in the world, but pickings were slim this week.

MERLINE LABISSIERE
Top 3
Client: Katie Harris, camera assistant

Photo: Lifetime

I think this was in the top three because the model werqed the SHIT out of her new haircut. Go on and get it, Katie. This doesn’t look like much of an outfit to me, but at least Katie’s happy.

SWAPNIL SHINDE
Eliminated
Client: Jennifer Cohen, production coordinator

Photo: Lifetime

Congrats, Swapnil – you had the worst look – falling apart at the seams, I might add – and the worst personality of the episode. Good riddance.

Judges’ Top 3: Kelly, Edmond, Merline
Judges’ Bottom 3: Ashley, Candice, Swapnil
Diva’s Top 3: Kelly, and Edmond and Merline by default
Diva’s Bottom 3: Candice, Ashley, Swapnil

—
© Democracy Diva, 2015.
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Welcome back! Let’s get “avant-garde,” except not really at all. 

The Challenge: The designers used 3D printers to create avant-garde looks inspired by three of New York City’s bridges. Every season, we get an avant-garde challenge, and every season, most looks don’t come anywhere near the definition of avant-garde, and the judges will praise things for being “wearable” and “red-carpet ready” even though that has little to do with avant-garde. Sigh. Such is the way of Project Runway.

Anyway, the 3D aspect of the challenge was a surprisingly brilliant idea – though I think it somewhat failed in execution because the printers couldn’t print anything larger than a few inches long. For all the talk about 3D, you can barely see most of the printing in the pictures, and even on TV there wasn’t much to look at. They should have sold this episode as ‘3D printing: now available for babies!” But it did lead to memorable lines such as Merline’s “I see things in 3D when I walk,” which I just don’t even know how to respond to. And of course you can count on Kelly for one-liners like, “I don’t even have a 2D printer,” which legit made me giggle out loud.

Guest Judge: Mel B, about whom I have nothing bad to say, because I was ten years old during the Spice Girls’ heyday and so I get to love those women unconditionally forever.

ASHLEY NELL TIPTON
Bottom 2
Bridgspiration: Manhattan Bridge

Photo: Lifetime

I think this should have sent Ashley home. It failed at all three aspects of the challenge: it was worlds away from avant-garde, she used the 3D printing in the least imaginative way possible, and even the judges admitted they couldn’t see what the hell this had to do with a bridge. The 3D design itself wasn’t very interesting, and the way she used it wasn’t any better. The pants and top had sheer polka-dot panels running through them, making any kind of undergarment (top or bottom) impossible. (That wouldn’t be my primary concern if this were actually avant-garde, but since it’s not… it’s a problem.) Even as the model’s nipple was poking out into the sheer fabric, Heidi was praising this for how well-fit this was. God, I’d hate to know what a bad fit looks like. Just sheer polka dots over a vulva, I guess.

CANDICE CUOCO
Top 3
Bridgspiration: Queensboro Bridge

Photo: Lifetime

Let’s get real: this is a Zac Posen gown with some shapes glued to it. I’ll admit the best view of Candice’s 3D work is actually from the side, so you really don’t get the full impact in photos, but I still thought this was significantly overpraised. I don’t like the seam down the center, and I feel that the lace-up corset and the asymmetrical skirt may have been a few details too many. This just felt overworked. And also, seriously, what the hell does this have to do with the Queensboro Bridge?

EDMOND NEWTON
Top 3
Bridgspiration: Manhattan Bridge

Photo: Lifetime

I know black detailing can look stunning in person, but I do get frustrated when Project Runway contestants do it, because it’s hard to see on TV and damn near impossible to view in photos. But if you brighten your screen the point where it might blind you, you can see that a lot more detail went into this than goes into much of Edmond’s work.  He still made a red carpet gown instead of an avant-garde look, so I wouldn’t have given him the win, but this had more detailing and creativity than I thought Edmond was capable of.

KELLY DEMPSEY
Winner
Bridgspiration: Brooklyn Bridge

Photo: Lifetime

She only used the 3D printing on the belt, which you can barely see. But Kelly made up for it by choosing a textured print that could ONLY work on a bridge-themed ensemble. I think her work using wires and angles and suspension really brought this look to an extremely creative place. The model basically had to hold the skirt onto her body, so I won’t pretend this was flawless, but it was far more conceptual than anything else on that runway. And you can call Kelly a lot of things, but “conceptual” usually isn’t one of them, so kudos to my girl for giving this one her all.

MERLINE LABISSIERE
Eliminated
Bridgspiration: Queensboro Bridge

Photo: Lifetime

What a disappointment. Merline knew all eyes were on her to do something architectural and out there, and she choked. This was somehow less avant-garde than most of what she’s made this season, and I hated that the different portions of the skirt were sort of just left to hang off the body instead of being tacked down together at the bottom. And we all know she’s not the first PR contestant to do that umbrella flap skirt – even the judges pointed that out. But it felt to me like I was always waiting for Merline to have the opportunity to really let her freak flag fly and blow us all away. This should have been the time for her to do that, and she just couldn’t. For that, and for how underwhelming this dress is as a whole, I’d have sent her home too.

Judges’ Top 3: Kelly, Edmond, Candice
Diva’s Top 3: Kelly, Edmond, Candice
Judges’ Bottom 2: Ashley and Merline
Diva’s Bottom 2: Ashley/Merline. I’d have sent ’em both home. I’m mean like that.

—
© Democracy Diva, 2015.
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Welcome to the Final Four, dear readers.

The Challenge: The designers were shipped off to Los Angeles and tasked with designing red carpet looks inspired by LA. The contestants had $400 and basically no constraints, and once again, no one really stood out for me besides good old Kelly from the Deli. Honestly, I felt that the challenge was a little weak – the LA inspiration didn’t end up mattering much at all, and it would have been fun to see a creative twist (not a time constraining one) to really push the designers to their limits. Instead, they churned out mostly-mediocre red carpet gowns.

Guest Judge: Christian Siriano, who they must have paid major bucks to show up, because he’s way too famous and successful for this guest judging shit now. But of course, knowing the ins and outs of the show made his input invaluable. Let’s keep the relevant and talented judges coming!

ASHLEY NELL TIPTON
Bottom 2

Photo: Lifetime

What was I supposed to like about this again? The fabric, which only looks a hair more expensive than American Apparel? Sorry, but that’s not enough for me, not with the fit issues and the strap to nowhere. Ashley has proven time and again that she works very well inside her little box, and very poorly outside it.

CANDICE CUOCO
Top 2

Photo: Lifetime

There’s nothing wrong with this Elvira on Ice costume, but there’s nothing interesting about it either.

EDMOND NEWTON
Eliminated

Photo: Lifetime

Cheap and boring. I don’t know why we had to watch an hour of Edmond just TORTURING himself over how and whether to cut this fabric. The drama the producers were desperately trying to wring out of that situation was just torture to watch. Regardless, Edmond deserved the auf for this disco ball disaster, but I’m sure the Tim Gunn Save will be unleashed to save him in the next episode.

KELLY DEMPSEY
Winner

Photo: Lifetime

As per usual, Kelly made the only cool thing on the runway. It’s not perfect – where her textile meets at the crotch is kind of strange, and the seam up the model’s butt isn’t particularly attractive either. But it was lightyears ahead of what her competitors brought (or failed to bring) to the table. I love the textured print Kelly created. And I had to laugh when Edmond was all, “HOW COULD ANYONE DREAM OF WEARING A JUMPSUIT ON THE RED CARPET?” He has clearly not been paying attention to the red carpet for the past five years. But Kelly has, and her little jumpsuit worked perfectly for the challenge.

Also, Kelly realizing mid-sentence that she’s making it sound like she owns the deli, when she actually just makes sandwiches = priceless. I am HERE for that shit, dear readers.

Judges’ Top 2: Kelly and Candice
Diva’s Top 2: Kelly and Candice
Judges’ Bottom 2: Ashley and Edmond
Diva’s Bottom 2: Ashley and Edmond

—
© Democracy Diva, 2015.
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God, how I’d love for this show to surprise me, just once. And not by having Tim Gunn say the F word again.

The Challenge: First, we were “treated” (sarcastic quotation marks required) to some extremely over-the-top performances about how SHOCKING it was that Edmond went home. We all knew last week that there was virtually no way Edmond was really gone, not with the Tim Gunn Save still fully intact. But I refuse to believe there wasn’t a better way to use it than have Tim appear to say goodbye to Edmond and then suddenly be all, NO! I VOW TO RESCUE YOU FROM THE DEPTHS OF DESIGNER HELL! No one on this show is a good enough actor to pull off any of the emotions or reactions that were required for this scene. It was extremely hard to watch, even by Project Runway‘s extremely low standards.

Anywho, as per usual, Tim Gunn visited the four remaining designers as they worked on their collections from home, and “surprised” them with a new challenge – one more look, of course – when they returned to New York for Fashion Week. Like so much else on this show, it was painful simply because it was supposed to be a twist, but instead it was expected and dull. You know what would have been a REAL twist? Seeing the designers get more than thirty goddamn seconds with their models. Because it virtually doesn’t matter how great a designer or seamstress you are – if you don’t have time to fit the clothes to your model, they’re not going to look very good. That’s just a fact, and a fact that gets ignored constantly in the making of this show. I’m not saying every episode requires hours of model time – part of the challenge is the time constraints, after all – but for the finale collection, to not have long and in-depth fittings is positively insane. Alas, instead, we did the same old shit as usual, with the designers hauling two looks out and creating a third to show to the judges as a preview of their full collections.

ASHLEY NELL TIPTON

Photo: Lifetime

I think the lack of time for model fittings hurt Ashley the most. Uber-thin models can wear a potato sack and still pull it off – that’s part of the reason so many models are so thin – but curvier folks need their clothes to be tailored properly. (Tailoring is a must for us all, but my point is that bad tailoring looks much worse on a curvier person than it does on a skinny one.) And the tailoring on every single piece was a nightmare. The skirt is too tight in the rear, and the fabric puckers and wrinkles at every seam. Furthermore, making sheer clothes without creating the proper undergarments beneath them is downright offensive – unless you’re doing a real, nontelevised runway show where you can show as much nipple as you please, you better damn well be making bras instead of just exposing the ones your models showed up in.

Photo: Lifetime

And how many seasons ago was it now that exposed zippers became my worst enemy? The contestants on this show refuse to stop using and over-using that trend even though its heyday must have been nearly a decade ago by now. I can’t believe how many years I’ve spent railing against a trend that I wouldn’t even have an opinion on if it weren’t for this show. Every dress I bought in 2006 had an exposed zipper, sure, but I’VE MOVED ON. Why can’t these designers do the same?

Photo: Lifetime

And I don’t think the headpieces, which Ashley clearly thought were genius, had anywhere near the effect she intended. They’re distracting, and they make Ashley’s collection look like a cheap Dolce & Gabbana knockoff. For all the bullshit the judges spew, Nina hit the nail on the head when she demanded of Ashley, “do you want people to remember the headpieces, or the clothes?”

CANDICE CUOCO

Photo: Lifetime

Speaking of knockoffs, that’s virtually all we got from Candice, who fancies herself a creative genius but can’t come up with an idea that twenty other designers haven’t already ripped off from Alexander McQueen. Like her competitors, and every designer on earth who doesn’t have enough time to fit their damn models, the terrible fit really hurt her, cheapening every piece she showed.

Photo: Lifetime

Is it still a boast-worthy achievement to make your own hat, if said hat is derivative, poorly made, and all-around ugly? Yeah, I didn’t think so either.

Photo: Lifetime

This robe-like garment is probably the best piece Candice showed – though you’d never it know it by the throwaway clothes she paired it with. What are those, spandex pants and a Hefty bag top? Even Kanye could design a better garment than that.

EDMOND NEWTON

Photo: Lifetime

Oh, Edmond, who was brought back into the loving arms of Tim Gunn, and immediately proved the judges were right to eliminate him in the first place. He has no vision, and a dearth of creativity. Being able to make a sexy little red dress that a thousand designers have made before shouldn’t qualify you to show at New York Fashion Week, and I think Edmond has proven he can’t make much else.

Photo: Lifetime

And the concept for your collection definitely needs to be something more than just “RUFFLES!” Ruffles: great for a potato chip; somewhat less great for the inspiration of your career-making fashion week collection.

Photo: Lifetime

Blech. Hard pass.

KELLY DEMPSEY

Photo: Lifetime

What’s strange about Kelly’s mini-collection is that the pieces she showed Tim at home, and even the ones she unpacked in the workroom, looked SO MUCH MORE EXPENSIVE than this. I know I caught a glimpse of a textured dress that looked fascinated and detailed and beautiful. So why was her mini-collection full of throwaway looks? Was this an intentional move, to show them her worst looks up-front, and blow them away with an amazing full collection next week?

Photo: Lifetime

It’s not that this is a throwaway look because it’s a tee shirt and shorts. Streetwear is Kelly’s bread and butter, and her collection should reflect that. But the high waist of those shorts makes absolutely no sense. It destroyed the proportion of the look and made the garments look cheaper.

Photo: Lifetime

Seriously, where are the incredible detail-oriented textures that Kelly was showing off to Tim? Did I make those up? Why am I looking at this weird club top and these supremely ugly stretch pants instead of a cool, Kelly-made textile? Did I just hallucinate an alternate universe in which a designer actually brings some runway-ready pieces with them to Fashion Week? (Probably.)

—
© Democracy Diva, 2015.
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Ughhhhhhhh. 

CANDICE CUOCO
Fourth Place

Photo: Lifetime

There’s an inherent problem with the structure of Part 1 of the finale episodes: it gives the judges the chance to critique everything they hate about the collection, but it doesn’t give the designers enough time to actually do anything about those critiques. So when Candice heard that her collection was overblown and derivative, there wasn’t much she could do except water it down, which didn’t actually make things any better. Telling Candice that her looks were blatant McQueen knock-offs wasn’t bad advice, but expecting her to be able to turn a copycat collection made for drag queens into an original one made for women in 48 hours was not even slightly reasonable. Wouldn’t it be better if the judges never saw a glimpse of the collections until the final runway show? At the very least, it would spare us the torture of having to watch the designers rush to fix problems that simply are not solvable in two days’ time.

This first dress is lovely, though as Candice herself noted, it has basically nothing to do with the rest of her collection. If you consider this dress in a vacuum, it’s a good one to start off the collection – it’s got a dark romance to it, and it fits better than just about every other garment Candice showed – but its lack of cohesion with the rest of the collection makes it a TERRIBLE choice for an opening look. The opening look is the fashion equivalent of a thesis statement, and this thesis statement appears to be about an entirely different topic than the rest of her paper.

Photo: Lifetime

I don’t really understand what makes Candice think she’s such a badass. A leather bustier does not a rocker chick make, at least not in 2015. And those slightly-cropped pants combined with the thick ankle-strap shoes were a truly awful idea.

Photo: Lifetime

Once upon a time, eons ago, you could count on these runway shows to have very few fit and construction flaws, and you could actually judge the collections based on aesthetics and vision and creativity and all that. These days, the designers are fixing so much of their collections in the hours before the runway show that the fits end up looking disastrous. This was a serious problem in Candice’s collection, whose leather pieces looked utterly depressing as they wrinkled their way down the runway.

Photo: Lifetime

Those blacks don’t even match each other. That is a rookie mistake, my friends.

Photo: Lifetime

This coat is still the only thing I really like about Candice’s collection, and I still find the garments underneath to be absolute wastes of space. For the love of all that is fashionable, just create an actual pair of pants that someone would actually want to wear to a place that isn’t a gym.

Photo: Lifetime

I don’t hate the skirt… mostly. I’m sorry, that’s about as much enthusiasm as I can exude over this collection.

Photo: Lifetime

This fits so terribly, I’m shocked it actually made it to the final runway. This is borderline offensive.

Photo: Lifetime

I don’t hate it, but I can’t pretend it’s original, either.

Photo: Lifetime

Things I hate: the fit of the bustline; the fit of the hips; the way the black leather seems into the red fabric like a claw from an arcade game; THE FUCKING EXPOSED ZIPPER, MY GOD, WHY WON’T THIS SHOW LET IT DIE ALREADY.

Photo: Lifetime

This originally had a giant hoop skirt beneath it, making it an over-the-top show-stopper of a piece. (Not an original one, or anything, but at least it brought the drama.) The watered-down version is more wearable, sure, but I also don’t understand what’s happening with the construction, particularly in the back. It looks like there’s some skin showing, and maybe like this skirt was tied together with black ribbons? That doesn’t make a great deal of sense to me, though I’ll admit I could see this dress on the red carpet. Mostly because, you know, people have already worn it.

Photo: Lifetime

When you see all the looks together, two things become even more apparent: 1) that opening look sticks out like a sore thumb, and 2) this collection mostly resembles what a cartoon fashion designer’s idea of grown-up, cool-girl fashion is, instead of the real thing.

EDMOND NEWTON
Third Place

Photo: Lifetime

I had to laugh when the judges told Edmond that his simplest garments were his strongest. I mean, they’re not wrong – his attempts at drama and fantasy are damn near atrocious – but his simple garments are as dull as the day is long. Do you know why Heidi and other women would want to wear Edmond’s clothes? BECAUSE THEY ALREADY OWN THOSE CLOTHES. I have never seen him make a decent dress that hasn’t already been sold at every department store in the universe.

Photo: Lifetime

All wrong. This is not how you experiment with volume. This looks like one huge, nightmarish, extremely shiny accident. And it doesn’t even come close to fitting in with the rest of the collection.

Photo: Lifetime

Didn’t Duncan get eliminated for this exact draping style in the season premiere?

Photo: Lifetime

Yeah, sure, let’s pretend this is high fashion, runway-ready, or in any way worthy of being shown at New York Fashion Week. Project Department Store? A surefire winner. Project Runway? Abso-fucking-lutely not.

Photo: Lifetime

I will not even dignify this with a response.

Photo: Lifetime

My fiancé pointed out, quite wisely, that he could see Kerry Washington wearing a lot of these pieces. And that that wasn’t a compliment, since when she fails on the red carpet, she fails spectacularly. (Kerry tends to have very high highs and even lower lows when it comes to her fashion choices.) I think this dress best reflects his point – I could see it on a red carpet, but definitely not on a best dressed list.

Photo: Lifetime

I wish I could bring myself to care about dresses like this, but I simply cannot.

Photo: Lifetime

This looks pretty bad in pictures, but I assure you, it looked infinitely worse on television. This was one of the least-flattering garments to ever appear in a finale episode of Project Runway. If Edmond can’t look at this and see the myriad of things that are wrong with it, then he’s got no business showing at Fashion Week.

Photo: Lifetime

Yeah, let’s all just pretend that this doesn’t look like a cat got into a roll of toilet paper.

Photo: Lifetime

At least it’s pretty, well-made, and slightly dramatic. It’s still not winning any awards from me, but it’s the only piece in the collection I am not diametrically opposed to seeing on a runway. (Again, probably because I’ve seen it on the runway before.)

Photo: Lifetime

You’d think only using three colors would make it easy to make a collection cohesive, but, apparently not. Anything that’s even slightly more than the most basic LBD doesn’t even look like it goes with this collection.

KELLY DEMPSEY
Runner-Up

Photo: Lifetime

My girl. My beloved Kelly from the Deli. She’s not perfect, not by a long shot, but she was by far the best of the pack this season, and it actually broke my heart a little bit, the look on her face when they announced Ashley was the winner. It looked like, for the first time in Kelly’s life, she really thought she had won, and I think we’ve all had that moment where we were FINALLY sure of success, and then the rug was pulled out from under us. After the judges named Ashley the winner, I gave one extremely frustrated, “Really?” and then just quietly stared at my television for a few minutes. I couldn’t even work up my usual anger or sadness, because I’m not really surprised the judges refused to award the win to the clear winner (yet again). More than anything, the decision just made me tired.

Anyway, the clothes: these pants are too sheer, but this silhouette is extremely interesting. More weird than wearable, but I’ll take a modicum of originality over Edmond’s sea of basic dresses any day of the week.

Photo: Lifetime

This is a damn fun dress. Tim said it best when he mentioned that what makes Kelly great is that her clothes make you smile. They have a youthful exuberance that I’m drawn to. They’re not the most expensive-looking or the most elegant garments, but they have a spark of badassery and a metric shit-ton of attitude.

Photo: Lifetime

I think she should have maybe done some kind of piping around the cut-out in the back – as is, it seems like a big droopy hole (which is also the name of my feminist punk bank). But I love the sporty-chicness of the front, and the textures Kelly created with her fabrics.

Photo: Lifetime

The glittery accessories mostly served to amp up the volume of Kelly’s looks, but here, they just look like Barbie rejects. They bring the clothes to a cheaper, tweenage level. A shame, because that bra could be something interesting if it were styled correctly. But that skirt, even with the Kelly-made textile, doesn’t really do much for me.

Photo: Lifetime

I’ll admit, I like this outfit much better than I did last week. The fit and proportion are vastly different – see what a world of difference the fit makes? – and now that I can see what Kelly was aiming for with these pieces, I get it. It works.

Photo: Lifetime

Meanwhile, these pants have really not grown on me. Is it me, or do they make the model look like she has a teeny tiny penis? Don’t get me wrong – I’m absolutely fine with the model having a teeny tiny penis. I’m just also fairly certain that wasn’t Kelly’s intention.

Photo: Lifetime

Utterly, impossibly cool. Kelly should have won solely for her ability to make a fannypack look chic.

Photo: Lifetime

I agree with Nina that this was a tad too ice-dancer-y to really feel high fashion, but I still give Kelly snaps for the work she did with these textiles. Just think about how much thought and detail had to go into every single piece in order to accomplish those patterns, and then compare that in your brain to what Edmond or Ashley did.

Photo: Lifetime

I’m not a fan of this white stretch fabric in general – it’s cheap-looking in photos, and you can see the seams right through it – but I love the collar and the waistband.

Photo: Lifetime

I’m still split on whether or not I hate Kelly’s final look. I have a knee-jerk negative reaction to those zip-up thighs, but there’s something downright ballsy about the disco-centric craziness that is this jumpsuit. Even if I’m unlikely to wear almost anything Kelly showed, I still think she was the clear winner of this season (which isn’t saying much, but, what can you do).

Photo: Lifetime

Together, Kelly’s models look almost shockingly cohesive and cool. A collection should be more than just the sum of its parts, and I think only Kelly managed to achieve that lofty goal. Though I’ll never be able to support that white stretch polyester-looking fabric. I’ve heard this collection looked AMAZING in person, so I’ll blame my hatred of that fabric on a trick of the light, because OOF, y’all.

ASHLEY NELL TIPTON
Winner

Photo: Lifetime

I have just a few hundred thousand problems with this collection. Let’s begin with the color palette, which is more appropriate for the Easter Egg Roll than it is for a fashion show. I think you have to be in kindergarten or on LSD to want to wear most of these colors together.

Photo: Lifetime

This isn’t so bad, but it appears to be a piece from an entirely different collection.

Photo: Lifetime

Let’s move onto the biggest crime of this collection: the fit. Oh, my dear LORD, the fit. For a collection that was supposed to be all about empowering curvier ladies, Ashley did them no favors at all. The judges heaped tons of praise on Ashley, for being so BOLD as to put a woman with curves in a crop top, as if she invented the concept. Spoiler alert: she didn’t. Don’t get me wrong – we should absolutely be encouraging women to love their bodies and show off as much or as little as they feel comfortable showing. But awarding Ashley the win because she made extremely unflattering, terribly-fit crop tops is just complete and utter bullshit. The producers made it so that Ashley was the only designer who used “plus-size” (I hate that phrase, but I’ll save that rant for another day) models, and then talked about how brilliant she was for being the only designer to use said models. What a bag of condescending bullshit that is. Project Runway wants to have it both ways – getting credit for doing something great for women’s body image, when they’re actually saying, “oh my god, it’s so hideously impossible to put clothes on a larger woman that we should give Ashley the win just for trying, even though virtually all of her garments look like shit!”

Photo: Lifetime

I kind of dig the texture, but loathe the silhouette.

Photo: Lifetime

This, from a woman who considers herself the best “plus-size” designer in the country, and whose belief in such was just reinforced by the show. Women of all shapes and sizes deserve SO MUCH BETTER than poorly-proportioned rompers.

Photo: Lifetime

I actually don’t hate this, because it’s the first garment I’ve seen that actually looks a little bit fashionable and/or original. It’s utterly nonsensical – the top looks like swimwear – and it certainly doesn’t come close to fitting in with the rest of her collection, but it’s not the most basic thing I’ve ever seen in my life. So I guess that’s an achievement.

Photo: Lifetime

Curvy women need real clothes that they can feel confident in. Not kangaroo pouches.

Photo: Lifetime

I don’t even know what I’m looking at. Seriously, someone please tell me what in the fuck this thing is. Is this model supposed to be from a modern-day retelling of Grey Gardens?

Photo: Lifetime

It’s fine. It’s a knock-off, but it’s not nearly as poorly made as some of Ashley’s previous entries.

Photo: Lifetime

I was furious to hear that Ashley glued those flowers onto her garment. It’s one thing to resort to the glue gun when you’ve got twelve hours to put a dress together. But for your FINALE COLLECTION? You had weeks to work on this thing, in the privacy and comfort of your own home, and you couldn’t be bothered to sew the fucking flowers on? To me, that is inexcusable, and completely encapsulates Ashley’s faults as a designer. Her attention to detail is almost nonexistent, and it’s why I had such a problem with almost every aspect of her collection.

Photo: Lifetime

These poor women. Project Runway is holding this image up as the peak of body-positivism, even though these women all look like they’re crying out for a real makeover. One that pays attention to fit and form and silhouette, and truly celebrates their bodies, instead of just giving lip service to them for the ratings.

Thank you all for helping me survive another disappointing season of Project Runway! I will NOT be recapping Project Runway Junior – the only thing I hate more than Project Runway is children on reality television – but check the blog again next week for my recap of the Season 14 decoy collections.

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© Democracy Diva, 2015.
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