Project Runway All Stars 3/1/12--"When I Get My Dress in Lights" summary

Previously on Project Runway: design dresses inspired by flags! I can’t believe they hadn’t done this one before. Things weren’t that exciting, in terms of drama. Or in terms of the runway, where most people just made a dress they’d made in the past. Or made the same dress they always make (Jerell, looking at you). Mondo won, and his dress was cool. Mila made a very interesting dress that was half short black sheath and half long red gown, and she was sent home. I don’t know, I can’t bring myself to care. It happened, and I cared while it was happening, but now I’m pretty “meh” about the results and all the details. (click for more)

Did they just sneak in an exterior shot of Parsons? They aren’t at Parsons. Right? Angela says this will be the “biggest test of your skills so far”. She snaps her fingers and the lights go off, and then I guess her skirt lights up? Maybe? But I had to rewind to see it, and it’s not very exciting. Sort of vaguely glow-in-the-dark. That was lame. They’re going to use a blacklight on the runway and use “lighting technology” to make an avant-garde look. “That we’ve never seen before on Project Runway”. Does that mean you’ll call people out when they make the same dress they always make? I think most avant-garde challenges on this show don’t end up producing actual avant-garde looks, but whatever. Angela also tells them the guest judge this week is Pharrell Williams. He’s going to give the design to one of his artists to use. $300 at the lighting store, and $100 at Mood. One day. Or, the rest of today and possibly tomorrow.

The lighting store is totally fun. Lots of LED strings and rope lights and magnetic square lights and fiber optics. It’s sweet. Austin says he wants to have “fairy lights”. Yeah. Mondo declares him a prima donna, and we see him spraying some aerosol all over the store to make a cloud. Huh? Kenley tries to buy $700 worth of stuff, as she was trying to make a whole dress out of lights. Michael buys hot pink felt at Mood. Mondo wisely is holding his fabric up to his lights and trying to see how they will look. Jerell is trying to mix prints, so let’s hope that works instead of looking like his usual outfits.

The workroom has a “darkroom” now, so they can see what their stuff looks like under blacklights. Jerell has fringe and feathers and whatnot. Mondo doesn’t really know what he’s going to do. Kenley is making plaid out of neon tape on her black fabric. Michael says his jacket hasn’t really come together so he gets dramatic and says he can’t continue with anything his heart isn’t in. Just admit it wasn’t working. He goes into the darkroom and Mondo jokes that he’s playing “Seven Minutes in Heaven” by himself. Hee. More confessional from Michael about how he changes his mind, and his clothes have to scream “WINNER!” or he’ll change course and make something else. He does have the speed to do that, I’ll admit, but the outfits he ends up with don’t always scream winner. Michael changes his outfit, and I would like to point out that he now has a black dress with neon tape.

Joanna time! She makes a bad “electrifying” joke and no one laughs. Kenley really has a plaid and it looks interesting from a distance. She also has some wide weave white upholstery fabric. No lights are seen. Jerell, in addition to all his other stuff, has a big peplum and is also talking about “ethnic flair”. But not “ethnic opulence”? Austin has a big hoop skirt framework on his mannequin. He wants it to be a little edgy but he also wants to stay true to himself. Michael is in the darkroom, with a hot pink coat and dress and a hat. One of those winter hats with earflaps. The tape on his dress is all wrinkled and Joanna tells him that kind of thing stands out on the runway. Mondo is making panels with the lights inside, but he doesn’t know where they’ll go. Joanna says since it’s avant-garde, he can really have them coming out of her head if he wants. True.

Jerell has used a bunch of fiber optic pieces so his peplum looks furry, somehow. Model fitting. Mondo has nothing. Austin has a nice shape to his skirt. Michael has yet another look done. Austin gets to call his mom on Skype and finds out her house got foreclosed. Aww. Mondo finally has an idea. Michael uses hot glue.

Back home Michael tells everyone the hot glue shows up on the dress, so he has to cover it with glue. Kenley has to sew a coat. Jerell says he is pulling out some “magical Jerell Scott stuff”.

Runway day. Kenley for some reason appears in confession with helmet hair. It looks terrible. Michael for some reason has decided to rip all the lights out of the dress and has to fiddle with them. Austin compares himself to God creating the heavens. Mondo’s dress is not lighting up, and he has no idea what to do. Hot makeup guy. Everyone wants crazy makeup. Michael says he has never been so pleased with his work. He calls a dress with giant loops and flashing lights “simple”.

So I guess that thing about Parsons was because that’s where the runway was? Because when time was up Kenley hollered “Let’s go to Parsons!” I think Angela is wearing a cutoff top. Isaac has decided to wear a neon shirt but he popped the collar, then wore a blazer over it. Ugh. Mondo: strapless dress with a sweetheart neckline. There are lines of lights up each side of the dress, and over her boobs. They kind of stick out so her boobs look pointy. There is also a light up green thing on her head, pink earmuffs, and pink stripes on the tops of the boots. The whole back of the dress is hot pink. Jerell: wide peplum with fringe made from fiber optic fibers, over a long black skirt that is not very visible in the dark. Then there’s a collar of more fiber optics, or maybe feathers, a ton of things sticking out of her head, and sunglasses. And a light inside her mouth. She looks like a lampshade. Kenley: the usual Kenley retro-shaped skirt, but with neon tape in a plaid pattern. Over the top of that is a giant jacket, with huge arms. Actually the torso is fairly fitted, it’s just the arms that are huge. The jacket is a big open square weave, and I think it has tiny pink lights all over it. It’s pretty good. Austin: his girl is wearing black chiffon, and a giant hoop skirt framework, with a string of lights draped around her. The lights are all in a string, starting at her head and winding around her body. See, when he was describing it, I thought it was going to be more solid black and lights scattered over. Not a big rope and a mullet hem. Michael: his dress is black with green neon tape, and big loops over her shoulders. In between the tape are rows of flashing lights, and also inside the loops. She’s wearing a ski mask, with her ponytail sticking out of the top of it.

Kenley says she was pushing herself. Pharrell likes it, but the tiny pink lights are just draped over the jacket, and he wanted her to use them inside the design somehow. She has volume on top and volume on bottom, but doesn’t look huge. Mondo’s dress is really him, but the tracks of lights aren’t curving enough to make her look curvy. Georgina thinks it looks like TRON, which I would argue is a complement here. She asks Mondo if he’s seen it. Travesty! TRON is awesome. The original, not the new one. Isaac likes it, but doesn’t think it’s avant-garde. Pharrell thinks the boobs are avant-garde because they are like Cadillac wings. Hee! Isaac says it reminds him of Teletubbies, which are his most favorite thing on earth. Somehow, not surprising in the slightest. Jerell wanted the movement of the fiber optics, and the “ethnic tribal thing”. Georgina thinks you might find her in a tent at 6am. Isaac thinks she bought some of her clothes at the joke store, and the styling is terrible. They also wonder why he used a long black skirt, which he did because he didn’t want you to see just her legs. The judges make him take off the skirt, and she has black hose on so…not bare legs either way. She looks much better. Pharrell tells him “now is when you say it was a trick and this was my idea all along”. Heh. Austin wanted some galaxies, and Angela wished they were more spread out. But everyone else seems to love it. They think it’s really pretty. Michael was going for “futuristic neon ninja warrior princess”. Yeah. The idea is good, but it looks like tape and the blinking lights are too obnoxious. Georgina tells him he needs to edit himself. Pherrell sees Mortal Kombat meets Grace Jones, and let me tell you, if he had really pulled that off, that would be fantastic. As it is (and maybe the truth if he HAD pulled it off), it’s suited for ComicCon. Well that’s true too.

Mondo used the different materials harmoniously, and he thought about the whole look carefully. Kenley did really well with her shapes, and she listened to the judges from last week. Austin went in a completely different direction from everyone else. His dress, without lights, would still be fab. Jerell had some potential, but the long skirt killed it. It ended up being half an outfit. Michael’s wasn’t pretty, even though at first when she walked out it looked fine.

Mondo is in. Austin wins! Wow. He gets choked up about it. Kenley is in. Jerell is out. Michael does that thing he does where he covers his face but doesn’t actually cry. Jerell likes what he does, so he’s not upset. He stayed true to himself. He’s glad to have made it this far.

Next week: I think something about business. Someone can get their stuff sold. They narrow it down to three.