The challenge was to make a high fashion garment using weird and unconventional materials purchased from two radically different venues in Austin Texas: a feed and tack store - Georgetown Farm Supply; and Stubb's Bar-B-Que, an eatery known for its outdoor dining and musical concerts. The designers chose a wide variety of unusual materials including bird seed, dried meal worms, guitar picks, strapping and harness leathers for horses, and roping. The designers had two days for this challenge.
On the morning of the second day of workshop time, Tim Gunn arrived to tell the designers that they had to make a second high fashion look that had to be cohesive with their first look, but the second look would use conventional materials from Mood. In this, their final trip to Mood, each designer had a budget of $200. Several of the designers had barely started their unconventional materials look, and now they had to make a second look. Ouch! Time was running out faster than the designers could put their looks together.
On the morning of the Runway with only ninety minutes of workshop time remaining, everybody buckled down to get their looks finished. Even though there were moments of panic, all ten models were dressed by the time Tim called "time" on everyone. Photos following ...
 |
| DH was not a fan of Erin's guitar pick and meal worm bustier, but I thought it was refreshing that she didn't do yellow for a change. Her second look, the jumpsuit, was forgettable - very boring. |
Erin made crazy flowers from dried mealworms spray painted with a metallic gold paint, mounted in melted and shaped guitar picks. They actually were really interesting, but I wasn't sure how she was going to make it look like a garment instead of just things stuck onto a background. Her second look was going to be a jumpsuit in a bold floral pattern. She ended up making a cupped bustier with band pins and gluing the "flowers" into the cups. I was NOT a fan of either look, but it certainly met the criteria and both looks were actually well made.
 |
| I liked Laurence's weird materials dress of leather, rope, fabric and birdseed, and I thought her second dress wasn't bad either, but the judges really disliked the mustard colored sheath dress. |
Laurence chose leather strapping, mesh strips, rope and birdseed. She formed a bodice and pleated skirt and glued birdseed onto selected panels of the dress. It actually looked quite beautiful. Her second dress was a brilliant mustard yellow with warm brown leather accents. It matched the birdseed color of the first dress with a simple sheath style accented by interesting leather shoulder epaulets and a rectangular cross-tied leather framed opening on the back. The judges loved the birdseed look but weren't a fan of the mustard yellow dress.
 |
| Roberi knotted twine using several techniques of macrame, but it was here and there and everywhere - no real structure or plan. Realizing his model would be exposed through the cords, he quickly made a flesh-colored stretch short-skirt and chest bandeau. His second look really clicked for the judges, with three different fabrics that actually complimented each other in a swoop style. |
Roberi was knotting a macrame dress - he called it his "anxiety" dress because he said he tends to knot when he gets nervous. His dress certainly wasn't covering his model, so he made a stretch panel in flesh colored spandex to go underneath and cover her exposed body parts. His second dress blended three different fabrics with widely different patterns cut into swooshing body-wrap panels that accented the model's curves. I hadn't expected much from the second look, but was actually very impressed by both looks on the Runway.
 |
| Rik's unconventional materials dress wowed the judges for the bodice, but sent them to sleep with the striped panel of sewn straps and leashes for the skirt portion. It ended up boring. His second look almost sent him home - too predictable. |
Rik made a leather and vinyl records dress bodice with sewn dog leash and mesh straps stacked in the skird for his unconventional materials piece. He followed that up with a distressed tweed sundress for the second look. They weren't bad, but weren't exciting either ... at least not when I was writing this post during the show. The judges seemed to agree with me and he was on the knife's edge of going home.
 |
| Cornelius wasted an entire day trying to figure out how to use his unconventional materials, finally settling on cutting up plastic drinking cups and spray-painting them to make these weird flat flowers. The judges didn't like the dress, it was very ordinary, but they did like his jumpsuit. However, it just wasn't enough to push him into Fashion Week. |
Cornelius made 3-D multi-colored large pointed flowers, like flattened poinsettias, for his unconventional dress. They really were fun and whimsical, but I'm not sure he stretched enough because the dress style itself was boring. He borrowed sunflower seeds from one of the other designers and glued those to the fitted neckpiece of the dress, trying to give the dress more dimension and visual interest at the last minute. That was a fail. His standard materials outfit was a jumpsuit with sparkling embroidered accents on the sleeves - a real style departure for him. The judges really liked the jumpsuit, but it just wasn't enough to save him.
Lots of pictures for you today. Who is going to Fashion Week and who was sent home? Roberi was the winner of the challenge and Cornelius was sent home. Tim Gunn's save from early in the season almost made it to Fashion Week, and I think Cornelius matured quite a bit under the pressure of Project Runway. Next week should be the first of the two weeks that usually are spent on the Fashion Week designers. I hope all of you have a wonderful Friday and I hope you enjoyed the photos.
No comments:
Post a Comment