Project Runway 3, Episode 2: Courting Royalty

Last week we endured a casting call, a destroyed apartment that was not repaired after it was ripped to shreds, Tim Gunn thinking he knew better than the guy who won the challenge, and… Vincent’s hat.

Now, I will say that no designer responded to my plea to help me look fabulous for the film festival opening night gala, but I am not giving up. It’s not until November so I have time to continue my campaign of fabulousness. Come on, designers. Men wear clothes, too, and want to feel good. Let’s just say that I bought a pair of Rogan jeans at a vintage clothing store for $50 not knowing that they really cost about $300 in the stores. I feel like a million bucks in them but I can’t wear those to the opening night of a film festival. I know that this is a show where they focus on women’s fashions and that’s all well and good. I have no problem with that but obviously I am not a woman and I would never wear Vincent’s “kooky hat.” I would shove that down his throat.

At this point, we’d normally go into viewer mail but there’s not that much to tell this week. Just one person who thought that Laura should focus more on her kids rather than her clothes or she would be the best-dressed mother in juvenile court. Far be it from me to criticize how someone raises her kids, but they are young and something tells me that the producers told them to go a little crazy so it would fit with her “I’m on vacation from my family” motif. But should one of them wind up in juvenile court, then yes, definitely the best-dressed one there.

This week we get everyone musing over Stacey’s departure. I’m sure they cut out all the parts where they are all saying, “How the heck Vincent made it through over her I’ll never know.” I know it seems like I’m being hard on Vincent but I thought his outfit was hideous compared to what Stacey did. Sure, the execution wasn’t that great but her model did not have a basket on her head.

We start back off to model selection. I would go through and recap who has what model but since Heidi didn’t tell them that the model they selected would be the model that they have to have for the entire show, I’m not going to go into which designer picked which model, although I will say that several of them chose to stick with the model they used in the first round. Please, I beg of you, just let them keep the same model. It will make things so much easier and it worked very well last season.

So what’s the next challenge? They are designing for an icon of American beauty – Miss USA, Tara Conner. Kayne, the pageant-dress designer, pretty much wets his pants at this point. Tara tells the designers that she will be competing in the Miss Universe pageant and that they are going to be competing to design the dress that she will wear during the Miss Universe competition being held in Los Angeles. It’s a very important part of the competition as it counts for one third of her score. Kayne looks like he’s crying because I’m pretty sure this has to be a dream of his, to design a dress that’s being worn at one of the big four pageants (quick…who can name the other three?).

Okay, let’s just be honest here. If Kayne doesn’t win this challenge then something has to be wrong with the universe. I mean, we’re talking the man who lives for bugle beads and spangles. This could not be more of a slam-dunk win for him than when Sandy, the bridal-store owner, got to work on a wedding challenge on The Apprentice.

With that, the designers head to the workroom and Tim explains the challenge more in depth. Of course, he has to remind them all that should they give Tara a crappy dress, she could pretty much not even make the semi-finals, which I think, like, only three other Miss USA’s have not been able to do. You’re thinking that I’m looking this stuff up, people, but I’m not. I’m seriously pulling this stuff out off of the top of my head. I can name three – Barbara Jordan (back in, like, 1976 from Minnesota), Kimberly Pressler of New York (who I never really liked but I loved Mpule Kwelagobe of Botswana who did win Miss Universe that year), and Shauntay Hinton of Washington, D.C., who never really impressed me either. Anyhoo, enough about me and the Miss Universe competition.

What is Tara looking for in a gown? She’s the second shortest girl in the pageant so she needs something monochromatic, and the dress must elongate her. Earth tones are good but no plunging necklines. They must see her and not the dress. While that statement at first doesn’t make sense to me, it kinda does in that the dress must accentuate her, her figure, and draw attention to all of the positive things about her (like her boobs) while negating all of the other stuff (like her height). After all of that, Tim drops the bomb that the designers will be working in pairs for this challenge. Angela, in a voiceover, tells us that she’s never done something like this before so she wants to work with someone with excellent construction skills. Who does she have in mind? Oh, I dunno. Kayne? Sure. For “construction skills.” Not the fact that he’s a pageant-dress designer.

Right. I’m buying that one.