Season 7, Episode 6
Original airdate: 2/18/10

Photo: Lifetime

Oh boy, a kid challenge.  The designers have to create outfits for little girls.  At least the girls aren’t the clients—they’re just the models.  So the designers don’t have to take the kids’ opinions into consideration.  Thank goodness, because that would have been disastrous.  They’ve got one day and 50 bucks to complete the challenge—but wait!  On day two, Tim Gunn tells them that they’re going to have to create a companion look for their regular models.  Oh jeez, there’s nothing worse than matchy-matchy mommy-daughter outfits.  Blech. (more…)

Season 7, Episode 5
Original airdate: 2/11/10

Photo: Lifetime

The designers are brought to the Hearst Corporation building (one of my favorite buildings in all of New York City—I had an audition at Cosmo Girl there once and I was in awe of the whole place—even the elevators are fancy) to meet Tim Gunn and Editor-In-Chief of Marie Claire magazine Joanna Coles.  The challenge is being built up as one of the biggest in the history of Project Runway and the prize for the winner as being “unprecedented.”  Well, I have to admit I was expecting something bigger, but the prize actually does turn out to be pretty cool.  Way cooler than last week’s prize of having a Campbell’s Soup logo-encrusted dress worn to a Campbell’s Soup event.  This week, the winning design will be worn on the cover of the April issue of Marie Claire magazine by none other than Ms. Heidi Klum herself.  After she’s popped that baby out, of course. (more…)

Season 7, Episode 4: “Design Your Heart Out”
Original airdate: 2/4/10

Photo: Lifetime

Every season on Project Runway, there’s a “Very Special Episode.”  You know, like the Very Special sitcom episodes of yore.  Well, this week is that episode… but it all seems a little weird this time around.  The designers must create outfits for “very inspirational women.”  They tell us a million times that these women are very inspirational.  They have all been affected by heart disease.  Yes, I agree that, like all life-threatening illnesses, heart disease is a terrible thing to have to deal with.  But I don’t know if these women are very inspirational.  What are they inspiring me to do?  Not get heart disease?  Well, I wasn’t aiming to do that anyway.  (more…)

Season 7, Episode 3
Original airdate: 1/28/10

Photo: Lifetime

The designers are taken on yet another field trip this week, but to a place much closer and awesomer than last week’s farm.  They are off to the curatorial department of the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art!  It is here that Tim gives them this week’s challenge.  And hoo boy, it’s a team challenge!  The designers have to work in teams of two to create a high-end, signature look that is worthy of a master collection.  They have two days and FIVE HUNDRED DOLLARS, more than any other challenge in the history of Project Runway, to complete their design.  (more…)

Season 7, Episode 2: “The Fashion Farm”

Original airdate: 1/21/10

Photo: Lifetime

Even though they’re finally back in New York City, this week’s challenge has nothing to do with the city at all.  The designers are bussed out to a farm in middle-of-nowhere New York State, and it’s there where they meet their models, whom are all dressed in potato sacks.  Tim tells the designers that they must use the potato sack as their fabric to create an outfit for their models, who are also their clients, to wear to an “industry event.”  I love how elusive they are about what this “event” may consist of.  Clearly it’s an event that is happening solely for the interest of this episode.  And why did they need to go all the way out to a farm to be told that they’ll be working with burlap?  The same “these models could look good wearing anything— even a potato sack!” effect could have been pulled in the comfort of their own Parsons runway.  Whatever. (more…)

Season 7, Episode 1: “Back to New York”

Original airdate: 1/14/10

Photo: Lifetime

I sure am glad to know that the Lifetime execs and producers have at least an inkling of sense in their puny little brains.  After managing to entirely screw up season 6 of Project Runway, it seems they’ve learned their lessons and have gone back to what works for season 7.  Project Runway is officially back in New York, back at Parsons, and back at Atlas!!!  Now if only it were back on Bravo…. (more…)

And back in New York City, thank goodness.  Read the E!Online article about the upcoming season, which will debut on January 14 at 10pm, here!

Season 6, Episode 14

Original airdate: 11/19/09

Photo credit: L. Gallo

Poor Carol Hannah is still sick.  I feel so bad for her—there’s nothing worse than being sick when you’ve got something really important to do (and having it filmed and broadcasted on national television).  But she forces herself to get to work and, after a whole lot of crying and throwing up and keeling over in pain, she manages to finish her collection.  Seriously, that girl should get bonus points from the judges. (more…)

Season 6, Episode 13

Original airdate:  11/12/09

Photo credit: Lifetime

I can’t believe we’ve reached the finale already!  Season 6 of Project Runway has just flown by.  So the final three designers are Irina, Carol Hannah, and Althea (should have been Gordana!).  Is this the first Project Runway finale that consists of all-female designers?  Let me check Wikipedia.  Oh, nope!  Season five’s finale consisted of Kenley, Korto, and Leanne.  I forgot about them. (more…)

Season 6, Episode 12

Original airdate:  11/5/09

Photo credit: Lifetime

The last elimination before Bryant Park!  Out of the five designers still in the competition, two are going home this week.  I wonder why they’re only having three designers compete at Fashion Week.  They’ve had four in previous seasons and it seemed to work just fine.  (more…)

Season 6, Episode 11:  “Best of the Best”

Original airdate:  10/29/09

Photo credit: Lifetime

I don’t know what it is, but I feel like something is lacking in this season of Project Runway.  Aside from the fact that it’s now on Lifetime and now tapes in LA, there is a tonal difference.  I can’t really put my finger on it, but this season is just not as exciting as previous Project Runway incarnations. (more…)

Season 6, Episode 10

Original airdate:  10/22/09

Photo credit: Lifetime

Ah, how things change and yet how they stay the same.  Shirin is gone, but Irina is still yammering on about how she’s soooo much better than everyone else. 

This week’s challenge is given to the designers on Rodeo Drive.  Every damn time I hear the words Rodeo Drive, I think of that scene in Pretty Woman.  You know the one: “How much is this?” “I don’t think that would fit you.”  “I didn’t ask if it would fit, I asked how much it was.”  And then later… “You work on commission, right?  Big mistake.  Big.  Huge.”  It’s a curse. (more…)

Season 6, Episode 9

Original airdate:  10/15/09 

Photo credit: Lifetime

Heidi’s clue to the designers about this week’s challenge is, “If you really want to shine, then your look must upstage the rest.”  Ok, this one’s not too hard to figure out—it’s gonna involve shine and the stage. 

Sure enough, the Sultan of Sequins himself, Bob Mackie, gives the designers their challenge: Create an extravagant stage look for Christina Aguilera.  (more…)

Season 6, Episode 8:  “A Fashionable New Beginning”

Original airdate:  10/8/09

Irina thinks all the other designers hate her because she’s won two challenges.  But, in actuality, no one cares.  What the designers are actually thinking is that it’s now down to only really talented people left and the competition has gotten much fiercer now that all the dead weight has been Auf’d. 

This week’s challenge is to make something new and fabulous out of an old wedding dress.  The models/clients are all, what Heidi calls, “recently divorced.”  However, one has been divorced 16 years and another has been divorced 14 years.  I wouldn’t exactly call that recent.  I actually think the wedding dresses that these women are wearing are not their real wedding dresses from their real lives.  I think the show gave the dresses to them. Why do I think this?  Well… they’re ALL hideous.  There’s not one pretty dress in the bunch.  Some of these women are young, pretty, and stylish.  Odds are at least one of them would have had a stylish dress.  I smell a rat…. (more…)

Episode 7:  “The Sky is the Limit”

Original airdate:  10/1/09

This week’s challenge is to create two looks, all in blue, that are consistent with the Macy’s INC brand.  Gotta love the sponsor product placement.  The winner will get to design a holiday dress for Macy’s.  Um, am I out of the loop here?  What the hell is a “holiday dress?”  Like a summery vacation dress?  Or a dress to wear during Christmas and Hannukah?  I’m confused. (more…)

Episode 6:  “Lights, Camera, Sew!”

Original airdate:  9/24/09

This week’s challenge has to do with LA’s biggest commodity: movies!  The designers must create a costume for a specific film genre.  The choices: action/adventure, film noir, science fiction, period piece, and western.  I loooove the way Tim Gunn says “genre.”  Actually, I love the way Tim Gunn says pretty much everything.  Gordana doesn’t want to end up with “western” because, she’s “not really American.”  No shit, Gordana.  You mean that accent you have isn’t from the mid-west? (more…)

Episode 5:  “Fashion Headliners”

Original airdate:  9/17/09

So I haven’t really taken much notice of designer Irina Shabayeva up until now, but she earns definite points in my book at the start of this episode.  Irina is not shy about sharing her less-than-favorable opinion of Althea’s most recent winning design (what I call the baggy diaper suit.)  Seriously, that outfit was not cute, and I’m glad someone agrees. Ok, moving on. (more…)

Episode 4:  “What a Woman Wants”

Original airdate:  9/10/09

Usually on Project Runway, when the designers are given the challenge of creating a design that makes their client happy, the clients are real women, a la the Mom challenge, the women-who-recently-lost-a-bunch-of-weight challenge, and the prom dress challenge.  This time, they’re designing for their models.  So basically, they’re doing what they always do.  Sure, they have to base the design on what the models want, but they’re still creating outfits for the same perfect bodies they’re used to creating outfits for.  Therefore, the episode’s title, “What a Woman Wants,” is misleading and not entirely appropriate.  What most normal women want is a far cry from what most of these fashion-forward, eight-foot-tall, boobless bean poles want. (more…)

Episode 3:  “Rumble on the Runway”

Original airdate:  9/3/09

Seriously, HAS everyone on this show gone mad?!?!?  I.  Do.  Not.  Understand. 

Ok, first, let me back up.  It took me three whole episodes, but I finally noticed this week that the designers aren’t getting to switch and steal their models each week.  No more “Models, this is a challenge for you, too….”  Too bad.  I loved all the “bitch stole my model” drama.   Supposedly the “Project Runway” models have their own show this year, called “Models of the Runway,” but, honestly, does anyone actually watch it? (more…)

Episode 2:  “We Expect Fashion”

Original airdate:  8/27/09

Is it just me or are the designers all pretty boring this year?  There’s no one among the likes of Santino, Jay, or Kayne.  Everyone’s just kinda… mreh.

Interesting personalities or no, the designers have quite a difficult challenge ahead of them:  Design a form-fitting look for an über-pregnant former-Mrs. John Stamos/ current-Mrs. Jerry O’Connell. (more…)

Episode 1:  “Welcome to Los Angeles”

Original airdate:  8/20/09

Two words: halter diaper. 

But let’s back up for a moment.  I have to admit, I was NOT happy when I found out “Project Runway” was moving to Los Angeles and to the Lifetime network.  Being a New School alum myself, I am so bummed that they’re not filming at Parsons: The New School for Design anymore.  But besides that, New York is the fashion capital of the world and Bravo is way hipper and way more cutting edge than Lifetime.  So, going into the first episode of the new season, I was worried. (more…)