Bilious green L.A. Logan and Christopher swap clichés about stepping up game, being on the bottom, getting out of their comfort zones, and Christopher whines that nobody understands him. Over in the female dorm room, they are gloating about how many women are left. Althea and Carol Hannah blow smoke about who will be in Bryant park and comfort zones and something else or another.
The designers are facing away from the runway, listening to rustling noises and getting worried. This is what passes for drama these days, one supposes. When they turn around, Heidi is standing in the middle of a row of dress forms, each of which is wearing one of the remaining designer’s winning garment. In the case of Logan, who has never won a challenge, this is something long and two shades of grey and I have no idea which challenge it was from nor any memory of seeing it. That’s pretty damning for a show about creativity. In the case of Irina (who has won more challenges than any one else this season and who won’t shut up about it as though this were a season where winning a challenge meant slightly more than squat), this means her giant pile of brown knits that won last week.
The challenge is to make a second look that goes with your winning garment. As usual, there is too little money for decent supplies and too little time for anything of quality or interest to come from this group. In other words, this is another one-day, make something pretty challenge.
Althea focuses on the paper-bag waist on her original design, which I DO remember seeing, because the model’s boobs were flying around and the short skirt looked like a giant black diaper because it had a paper-bag waist and a bubble hem which combined for something quite unfortunate in shape. Irina, predictably gloats about her Aspen look being the basis of a collection. Gordana has the grey sort of mummy wrap dress from the divorcé challenge. Christopher has his pixie prom dress and decides that it needs to have a matching gown. Logan buys lots and lots of zippers at Mood, claiming that his look had a zipper detail on it somewhere. Christopher finds and buys 30 yards of something shiny and silver. Or white. Irina is making a dress that starts out as a work look and ends up a cocktail dress, which isn’t necessarily a contradiction in terms.
Carol Hannah is panicking and gets a Pep Talk From Tim TM that inspires her to stay in her comfort zone and make a pretty dress. Workroom. Irina is cutting the pattern apart on her upholstery fabric to make a brocade. Althea is making trousers that are tight from ankle to knee and then full until pulled in on the high, paper-bag waist. In black, and there is a certain Princess PuffySleeves look about the silhouette.
Montage of designers includes Gordana’s back story: child of Bosnian-Serb farmers. Those of us old enough to remember remember that would have been a shitty place to be 20-some years ago. Logan is a straight gear-head from Idaho. Carol Hannah dithers and wanders off for coffee. Trash talking. Is it time for the runway yet? Tim’s Walk-About TM. Tim agrees with Carol Hannah that she does, in fact, have a scary mess. Tim loves Irina’s dress. Tim hates Christopher’s gown and says that it looks like the first dress’ dowdy, white-trash mama. Althea’s pants are scary. Logan is focusing on his color palette and zippers.
The zippers and the collar Logan is making. Irina and Althea make a big whispering mean-girls stink about Logan being a cheat and an idea thief. Then Irina turns on Althea and talks about her behind her back in the same terms, with a side of ridicule thrown in for not even seeing that she’s just the same a Logan. Rinse and repeat this scenario several more times randomly through the remainder of this review, and you will have the entire episode. Your humble narrator will now skip ahead to the runway and the judging.
Logan puts on his magic silver pants for good luck. Good lord, but that boy is bow-legged. Is he also a barrel racer? Heidi comes out in something so fucking hideous that she must have lost a bet or let her daughter pick things at random from the closet. She is wearing silver leather Burmuda shorts, a ruffled, flowery chiffon blouse in a hot pink print, and a black waiter’s jacket. I am frightened. Our judges tonight are NinaGarcia, Uncle Nick from Season 2 and Kerry Washington whose Wikipedia page tells me is an American actress who has been in movies I’ve seen. And I saw Logan’s dress, too, but same amount of memory has been expended in both instances, which is to say, exactly none.
Carol Hannah’s cute dress is cute. Althea has made a strappy-backed white tank to go with the scary pants, and a giant grey fuzzy knit wrap-bolero-thing is thrown over that. Logan has made a nice top with all those zippers, and a skirt that looks like a goth brothel lampshade. I know I used that phrase before, but this is the boudoir lamp, and the other one was from the public space. Irina has made a huge cocoon wrap out of that brown sweater knit and tossed it over her cocktail sheath. There is some very weird shit happening on the hip and hem, and nobody says a word about it. Gordana has made a sort of deconstructed jacket with tons of detailing at the waist to create the fit. It’s very interesting and I can see the same woman who would wear the grey mummy wrap in this.
Christopher is doused with ice water, verbally: proportions off, parade float, bedskirt, totally unrelated pieces. Irina: up-town chic, Kerry would call for it after seeing it on a runway, and NinaGarcia is aware that the empress has no clothes, but the other judges have drunk the kool-aid. Gordana is kicked in the teeth, verbally: old, drab, sad, Soviet-era dreariness, dated, office worker in Poland. Carol Hannah is delicious and Logan is a self indulgent student. Judy Jetson, Nick calls it. Althea’s suit gets the love.
Moment of under-bus-throwing between Althea and Irina (see note above). Deliberating. And Carol Hannah and her cute little dress are in. Althea is the winner and she better keep one eye open tonight when she sleeps (coughIrinacough). Christopher, for reasons unknown to all intelligent life in this galaxy is in. Logan and Gordana get a final reaming from the judges and then the magic is spent from Logan’s silver pants and he goes home. Gordana gets to stay and suffer under Heidi’s obvious hatred for another episode.