PR 13 Ep 7: Chopard Showdown

So, we start off with the remaining designtestants mourning Char’s Aufing, so, yeah, you know that’s a twist waiting to happen. But first, the designers are taken to the runway, where they meet Tim and Chopard jewelers’ co-president and artistic director Caroline Scheufele. Behind them are displays of over a million dollars in jewels, upon which their next challenge is based.

They will be tasked with creating an evening gown — yes, another gown challenge — that is inspired by whichever Chopard jewel the designer gets to select. They will have one day and just $250 to make a gown worthy of hundreds of thousands of dollars of gems.

Before we get started, though, Tim is a little verklempt. He wanders into the workroom to call the designtestants around and, out pops Char. Tim has decided that maybe he should have saved her last week, so now she’s back and everyone is happy … until they realize that The Save is gone for the season. Uh huh and uh oh.

After the sketching, but before Mood, Tim takes the designers on see the Charles James exhibit at the Met which showcases the couturier's ball gowns and gala dresses, and even shows how some of the gowns were constructed. I would think that would be an amazing, eye-opening, instructive trip that might help some of the less, shall we say, gown-worthy designers … Samantha, Korina?

But, let’s rip ….

THE SAFES

CHAR 

After last week’s Yellow Disaster — which, I think, should have sent Sandhya packing since she railroaded Char into the color — Char is playing it safe … with peplums and cutouts. Tim worries that it seems bridal and prim, but I think Char just wants to make it to another week. It’s cute, though a bit short, and, well, that’s it.

EMILY 

At the critique she asks Tim if he’s worried about the ‘point’ on the draped back of her dress and he says, “I don’t see a point.” I thought, as in, ‘it’s pointless.’ It’s sad and droopy from the model’s hair on down, and the bottom hem is uneven. I don’t know how this didn’t go Bottom Three.

FADE 

Tim thought the original neckline, with a thick gray strap, looked like an Ace bandage, so Fade fixed that. But what he gave us wasn’t an evening gown, but pretty little dress a woman could wear to the country club. I like his designs, but he seems to have missed the point of the challenge.

SANDHYA 

I don’t get it. To me a gown is floor length and stunning. This is just a dress in a weird — even though I like it — fabric. It bears no resemblance to a gown or to any of the creativity of the Charles James dresses. This could have gone in the Bottom as well.

THE TOP TWO

KORINA

She doesn’t ‘do’ gowns; we get it. But she does do ethnic, Native American prints, and so she chose what seems like a Native American blanket — turned out to be upholstery fabric — and wants to make a coat over a dress. Tim points out that her seams are off, ruining the print, and warns that Nina has bitchslapped a designer for awkward seams, so Korina takes it apart and fixes it, leaving her little time for the actual dress. I’m worried that she’ll just make some stapled and glued and pinned black tube dress and hope hope hope the judges don’t want the model to remove the coat!

WHAT SHE SAID

My look is so dramatic. She just completely commands the room.

WHAT I SAID

Wow. Show-effing-stopper. I guess this is what happens when Korina merges her style and design sense into the challenge perfectly.

WHAT THE JUDGES SAID

Nina loved it; she said the ethnicity of the fabric made her dream, and she loved the way the coat and dress truly showed off the jewels. The Adorable Zac Posen™ adored the dress, calling it Korina’s best work, even with it being kind of spectacular Dracula. And when he asked the model to remove the coat, well, he was as stunned as I with how gorgeous, yet simple and chic the dress was.

Heidi, of course, wants the dress in every color, and guest judge Caroline Scheufele said Korina’s entire look really showcased the jewels.

WHAT HAPPENED

Korina gets her first win; and deservedly so.

SEAN

Riding high off of two wins — and apparently forgetting the two weeks he very nearly went home — Sean is very confident he’ll be best in show again, even though he and Samantha chose the exact same fabric. Still, one look at Samantha’s dress and Sean could have sent down a model in a blue sack carrying the jewels in a Duane Reade bag and still beaten Samantha; just saying.

However, he also very nearly made a terrible mistake. When Tim popped in for a visit, Sean was playing with the idea of shoulder pads … on the model’s hips. Tim nearly did a Nina Garcia Bitchslap and reminded Sean that no woman really wants bigger hips. Bullet dodged.

WHAT HE SAID

She looks so beautiful and stunning. It looks expensive.

WHAT I SAID

It’s a really simple dress, but since the jewels are so much, it really works. And the back is gorgeous.

WHAT THE JUDGES SAID

Nina called it stunning, too, and added that the velvet trim was a smart choice to showcase the jewels; good color, great back, elegant. Caroline Scheufele thought the dress would be perfect for the Chopard catalogue and also called it elegant. Heidi loved the design, and the amazing fit, and was pleased that Sean was really stepping up his game; she actually said Wowza.  The Adorable Zac Posen™ offered congratulations, calling it good work, regal and impressive.

It also probably helped that his model loved the dress and really showed it off. Even during the UP Close section.

WHAT HAPPENED

Sean gets Second Place and seems almost miffed by it; please do not become Kini and think you should win every week.

THE MIDDLE TWO

AMANDA

Okay, it’s a gown challenge and in what universe does gown mean jumpsuit? Sure, if they said Red Carpet look a jumpsuit might work, but again … GOWN!!!

Amanda decided to create a sheer dress  worn over a jumpsuit, and she was creating all these heart designs — she picked her jewels because they were hearts and her last name is Valentine … excuse me while I wipe the vomit off my chin — that Tim just thought were awful; she scrapped them, but, for me, it didn’t help.

Her fabric choice didn’t help, either, in that it was difficult to work with and cased her all kinds of tsouris; sheer nightgown? Superhero? Hot mess?

WHAT SHE SAID

You see the ‘floatiness,’ but then you can see the jumpsuit. She looks like a badass.

WHAT I SAID

She looks like a hot mess and not at all what the criteria of the challenge asked for, i.e. a gown It looks like something a 50s movie star would wear in a bad film noir. A really bad film noir.

WHAT THE JUDGES SAID

Heidi asks if Amanda thinks she’s in the top, and Amanda replies ‘Yes.’ Heidi agrees, and I passed out; seriously, I wanted a 3D version of the PR so I could pretend to slap the dumbass out of Heidi. But, she said she liked that Amanda takes risks — in this case, that means not fulfilling the challenge. Nina loved it and called it editorial; I would call it editorial pages of the newspaper and line a birdcage with it. Caroline Scheufele said it was a great look.

Only The Adorable Zac Posen™ voiced his concern that it wasn’t good — he called the fabric choice torturous — and said it would land on a Worst Dressed list.

WHAT HAPPENED

While the women seemed to love her look, everyone admitted that Amanda was not in consideration for a win, so she gets a Safe.

KINI

He’s starting to wear on me because of his I should win and everyone else sucks attitude. And so, naturally, I was pleased to see him stumble into a pair of unruly breast cups this week that seemed to be his undoing.

His chose neoprene because in his world, I guess, neoprene is a gown choice, and added chiffon, so he could showcase both the structure and the flowy. The flowy worked, but even Tim wasn’t pleased with the Breast Bullets he saw during the critique.

And I wasn’t pleased with his dogging out of every single other designer, while pushing his pudgy paw over his back side to compliment himself. We all know where that kind of snarky over-confidence leads …

WHAT HE SAID

She’s gliding, the flow of the chiffon in the back … perfect.

WHAT I SAID

It’s really kind of bland and, I think, kind of Las Vegas bride.

WHAT THE JUDGES SAID

Heidi liked the sheer over the structure, and wished the skirt were shorter—in the critique Tim told Kini the skirt should be longer proving that Tim always wants chic and Heidi always want shorter—and pointed out the messy cups; she also liked that it was different. The Adorable Zac Posen™ agreed about the length and the ‘boob darts’ — he called them an eyesore — and said the neoprene was a bad choice.

Nina liked the styling, and she liked the dress, though from the waist down she found it all to be too much; a mistake and not very well executed. Caroline Scheufele thought the color was a good choice to show off the diamond hoops.

WHAT HAPPENED

Kini wasn’t really bad enough to be considered for the Aufing, so I placed him with Amanda in The Middle.

THE BOTTOM TWO

ALEXANDER

He picks the giant red stone necklace which is a showpiece all by itself. He could have sent the model down in a strapless bra and panties and that gem would have stolen the show. But, alas, Alexander was too drawn to the Charles James exhibit and so he opted to go for a draped and structured and twisted and creased gown in a sad looking gray.

During the critique Tim wisely suggested that the crew neck was a bad choice for highlighting the necklace and wondered what Alexander would say if the judges called it a ‘lava flow’ dress?

But he wasn’t having it, and he was going to pin and hand sew that gown if it killed him; which it might have if he’d had enough time to finish and didn’t have to sew his model into it, and leave a punch of pins holding it together.

WHAT HE SAID

Just the way that it’s moving and the way the crinkled silk taffeta is shimmering … everything is on point.

WHAT I SAID

It’s very structural, but so structural that it seems kinda stiff. And the back? It’s like a hodgepodge of messy idea and pins and bumps. I’m thinking topographic map of southeastern Wyoming.

WHAT THE JUDGES SAID

Heidi hated that the model’s figure seemed hidden and pointed out how bad the back of the dress was, as though it was a last minute afterthought not very thought out, and noted how, up close, it was even messier.

The Adorable Zac Posen™ made kind of a side-eye OMG at Nina and then pointed out that he can't see the jewelry because it's hidden underneath the gown's rising neckline — you could clearly see the jewels on the runway. Nina said it reminded her of "Princess Grace stuck in the spin cycle of the washing machine." That can’t be good. The Adorable Zac Posen™ chimed in with the seeing of the pins, the tortured fabric, but said it was an ‘Ok’ dress; Nina shot back, “It’s a terrible dress” and said she couldn’t understand how he could pick that jewel and then pick that fabric.

Caroline Scheufele simply said the jewel needs a different dress.

WHAT HAPPENED

Even though Alexander’s been renting a space in the Bottom for a while now, because he at least tried, he’s safe.

SAMANTHA

She doesn’t do gowns; she’s never been to a wedding; she does separates, and casual wear and never anything fancy. M’kay, then why audition for a design show and not a Casual Urban Wear Show? I‘m over that whole, This isn’t my thing excuse.

But then, obviously, this isn’t her thing because when Tim comes by she tells him how she’s pushing herself and then shows him a simple — so simple I could probably do it … with a glue gun — sweetheart neckline. Tim dubs it boring and says it’s just a pretty dress.

Pretty mess.

WHAT SHE SAID

It’s clean, it’s polished. The side flaps have been pushed down, but I really pushed myself.

WHAT I SAID

Side flaps? Is it an airplane or a gown? And by pushing herself does she mean Auf the show?

WHAT THE JUDGES SAID

Heidi hates it; there’s no design, and contrary to what Samantha keeps saying, she didn’t push herself. The Adorable Zac Posen™ frowns at first, then said he thought it was interesting at first, then says at second thought it’s drab and there wasn’t much to it so he would say no more.

Nina called it boring; she said it was the dress a star's assistant would wear, but never a star; she then said it was "like the white t-shirt of long dresses." She shoots! She scores!  Caroline Scheufele called it a bad color and a bad dress for the jeweled watch and ring.

WHAT HAPPENED

Boring always gets you Auf’d on the PR. Buh-bye.

MY TAKE

Another evening wear challenge? I love a good gown, but the Heidi Red Carpet look followed by at least half the designers making a wedding gown, and this week another gown? Enough already. Where are the female wrestlers of yore? How about a porn star challenge? Female dogs? Something new?

And Chopard? I mean, I liked the idea of a jewel challenge, but, seriously, wouldn’t Claire's have been the better choice over the luxurious Chopard line? Is Chopard so desperate for publicity that they’ll showcase their jewels ion the PR? It seemed like a mismatch.

And the Tim Gunn Save for Char? I like Char, but she hasn’t one won challenge, or even been in the Top Three or Bottom Three. She’s a safe, and a safe shouldn’t be saved. 

And after the judges, well, at least the women, raved about Amanda’s jumpsuit-not-a-gown it’s very clear that they want her at The Tents. When you completely avoid the challenge and do your own thing — even dubbing it a ‘risk’ — you should fail. I mean, what if she’d sent down a swimsuit because she really thought that would be risky? I loathe her and don’t see why she’s still here. She’s Gretchen 2.0; bohemian crapfest.

But anyway … what did YOU think?