Project Runway 3/18/10--"Takin' It to the Street" summary

Previously on Project Runway: the designers had to make outfits based on one of the four ancient elements: earth, air, fire, or water. Almost no one does anything that is immediately identifiable as their inspiration. Jonathan wins something, finally, for making a light, airy dress based on laughter. That one you could tell what it was about. Ben actually gets screen time, but mostly because he’d decided to make his “water” outfit be a suit that is supposed to be about sharks. It’s not. Sadly it has an insane crotch, and I guess Amy’s “hair bowl” is creative or whatever. So he went home. (click for more)

Amy needs to step it up. I don’t know that she’s lost herself so much as sometimes she needs to reign in the crazy. Maya says everyone’s won a challenge except for her. Really? …I must admit I’m too lazy to look. But it’s possible.

Heidi says today they must get into a “New York state of mind”. Tim will meet them, but in the lounge instead of some fabulous location. Anthony cleverly knows he should probably just wait for Tim to tell them what’s going on instead of trying to guess. Tim meets them with Collier Strong, so it’s the makeup people’s turn to have a commercial. They will be sent out into the city, to one of four “distinctive” neighborhoods: Chinatown, the East Village, the Upper East Side, and Harlem. Emilio says that being from New York, he must win this challenge or it will be disappointing for him “and [his] people.” Also: teams of two! Haha! Emilio immediately interviews that he prays not to be stuck with Mila, so you know that is the pairing. Each team will have two looks, one for day and one for evening. $300 total, and team leaders will be selected by random draw. They are Anthony, Amy, Emilio, and Jay. Anthony takes Maya, Amy picks Jonathan, Emilio takes Seth Aaron (oo, I was wrong), which means Jay gets Mila. Emilio just gloats because he knows Jay and Mila don’t like each other. Both of them interview how much they hate this.

The neighborhoods shake out like this: Jay and Mila, East Village; Emilio and Seth Aaron, Harlem; Amy and Jonathan, Upper East Side; Anthony and Maya, Chinatown. Collier Strong talks about some makeup stuff. They’ll get 30 minutes to sketch in their neighborhood, and then go to Mood.

Emilio says Harlem is about “churches, liquor stores, and fried chicken.” Sigh. Everyone is wearing denim. Eventually they find a mosaic with a lot of colors and cool artwork. Anthony and Maya wander Chinatown and think red. They’re looking at paper dragons, the kind that have accordion folds? You know what I mean? Anyways, instead of thinking “dragon” they are thinking “accordion folds”. Amy and Jonathan immediately notice that the Upper East Side is very static. They spy a church with a cool texture of stone and some wrought iron fences. Jay and Mila look at graffiti. Jay tries to lead Mila but he doesn’t always make sense.

It’s a one day challenge again. Oh, they went fabric shopping but it wasn’t exciting. Tim warns everyone that the team leader might not be the one going home. Jay is doing the day look, with some crazy pants. Mila scoffs in interview but says they’re his pants. Emilio is doing a Billie Holliday throwback for his evening look. Anthony is trying to lead, but he says Maya has already admitted she has control issues. She’s getting bossy. Jonathan has an idea for pleats, and he says Amy’s design has lots of detail too. Anthony’s trying to do his 3D look for his evening look, but Maya is telling him what to do and not doing her own outfit. He interviews that she’s claiming she’s concerned because she’s an “artist”, but at this point, everyone is an artist. Seth Aaron doesn’t sketch, so Emilio feels he has to watch him closely to make sure he doesn’t do anything random. Mila and Jay are not talking to each other. Jay says this is “professional”. Jonathan and Amy have a giant amount of pleats. He knows that they are both so detail oriented that there is a real chance they won’t finish.

Collier Strong, while attractive, does not have an interesting segment. It never is, sadly.

Tim time! Emilio explains the denim day look and non-denim evening look. Tim has nothing to say, really. He does have things to say to Anthony and Maya, namely that their fabric of the day jacket is “weak” and why did you reject the stripe? Why isn’t that the jacket? Maya had previously rejected a striped fabric, that was one of the times Anthony was talking about how she’s bossy. Jay’s pants are like jodhpurs, apparently, and Tim points out no woman wants wide thighs. He swears they will hit at the right spot, and Mila barely contains her smirk. They don’t know what the day look will be. Or, Mila’s look anyway. Jonathan and Amy may be at risk of over designing. Tim reminds them it’s not how much they can get done, but if the look works.

Jonathan realizes he may be designing “a carnival”. Anthony has to hand stitch all his details in his dress. The models come in and Jay and his model whisper about how much they don’t like teams. Seth Aaron cuts up his jacket in front of his model, who kind of freaks. But it works. Jay hasn’t started one of his pieces, but judging from how many people had to finish pants last week? And I mean from start to finish the day of the show? A tank top is not that much of a concern. Emilio just laughs at them. Amy says she’s never seen Jonathan struggle with time so she’s concerned. He’s getting sloppy.

Morning comes, and Jonathan thinks it is physically impossible for him to finish. Mila complains about aching and getting done. Now, they might be editing, but from what I see, Maya and Amy are listening to her and they are in no way interested in what she has to say. Back at Parsons everyone gets to work and freaks out. Anthony has on a teal cardigan that I think I own. They have one hour to finish. Anthony thinks Maya’s look is “grand-mama”. Jay’s tank top is kind of weird. Jonathan and Amy are doing…something, Emilio is confused. Mila is determined to defend herself on the runway. Jay interprets this as Mila being willing to throw Jay under the bus, which is pretty much what she meant anyway. Jonathan and Amy work up into the last possible second.

Kors has decided to be gone tonight. Sad. Francisco Costa, women‘s creative director for Calvin Klein, is sitting in for him. Guest judge is Molly Sims. They start the show with a gong, which tells you this is Anthony and Maya. The day look is a black knee-length skirt with red darts, and a wrap top in striped brown. It looks cute, although not earth-shattering. I do enjoy that the model has chopsticks in her hair. A thin belt holds the top shut. The evening look is a short black dress with a plunging V, and all down one shoulder and across the front are open squares of tan fabric. They’re 3D and hollow. Jay and Mila: gray pants that are tight except for at the hips (so…jodhpurs) and a tank top that is black with red and black horizontal stripes on the front panels. Stripes which don’t match up. Mila’s look is red tights, a short skirt in a black and white almost checkered pattern, and a black and white jacket. The jacket is mostly black with some white piping, and white shoulders. Mila claims her model is giving it edge, but throwing the devil horns at the end of the runway with the same bored look on your face does not qualify as “working it.” Also I think that was supposed to be evening and it wasn’t really evening. Jonathan and Amy: orange sherbety sleeveless top with pleating all along the shoulders and down the front. There’s a matching belt, and then the top fans out into a peplum. Underneath is black capri leggings. Jonathan’s evening look is a tight brown dress with a pattern cut into it. It’s knee length and has a gathered halter neckline. It looks really good. Emilio and Seth Aaron: black jacket with a high collar and elbow-length sleeves. This is in denim, and jeans too, I guess. We don’t see the top underneath the jacket but it looks mottled pink and black. Also there is a giant hat in red and black plaid. The evening look is a long dark dress with a seam or zipper all up the front. It’s boring except for the part where the skirt is slit and lined with dark mustard yellow.

Jay and Mila, and Amy and Jonathan, are the losers. They must leave. Emilio talks about denim and gold stitching, which looks pretty cool. Heidi loves both pieces. They did seem to work well together, especially where Emilio made Seth Aaron use some color. Nina still has criticism, mostly that there are too many things going on in the jacket. Anthony was sidetracked by the Peking ducks when he went to Chinatown. The day look with the stripes and design was inspired by the buildings. Nina likes the day look but wants more color in the evening look. They all seem to like Maya’s look better. Anthony lets everyone know Maya is bossy, but does it in his Anthony way so everyone smiles and he doesn’t seem like a bitch.

Amy and Jonathan are up first, and she talks about patterns in stone and the wrought iron. They also got along very well. Nina doesn’t think the day look is polished. Heidi thinks it’s ugly. The evening look is a little more sophisticated but it’s also got problems, namely that the front panel with the cut fabrics ends abruptly and the other fabric is dark. So it looks cheap and kind of like it was a mistake. Jay doesn’t say a lot, but Nina then speaks up that she loves Mila’s look and hates Jay’s top. Francisco somehow likes that Jay’s look isn’t perfect. When asked how they worked together, Jay says “We worked…professionally.”

Amy gets too caught up in the technical aspects of her work. Her look was more Lower East Side. It might have been better as a dress. Jonathan overworked his dress. Jay’s pants looked poorly made. And Mila seemed to have taken over. They really don’t have a lot of bad things to say about Mila. All the judges like Anthony’s dress but they really get excited about Maya’s day look. It was subtle but had great design. Seth Aaron’s whole outfit worked, and he and Emilio put some effort into making both outfits relate to each other. But Nina was bored by Emilio’s dress.

Heidi wastes no time in telling Emilio he has won. Seth Aaron has also won. They’re both very pleased. Anthony and Maya are in. Mila and Jonathan are in. Amy is out. She’s proud of herself and is really happy for the experience. Jonathan is in tears too. She points out she was never afraid to take a risk.

Next week: everyone’s dream! Freaking out! “Disco straightjacket”! Would it kill them to give us some kind of vague hint about what the challenge actually is?