PR 16 Ep 9: She's Claire-ly A Cheater

We got another week of ‘To Be Continued ...’ last week and I will say, this time it was worth it. As you recall, last week, after Claire was announced as the winner, Michael left the stage, and that’s right where we picked up again this week. Michael speaks with Tim Gunn and says he feels Claire’s win lacks fairness.

Tim being Tim says Michael is entitled to his opinion, but then Michael plays the cheating card; he tells Tim that Claire has a measuring tape in her room and measures her clothes and uses those measurements to make her garments week to week, most notably, he says, the shirt Claire and Shawn used in the Good and Evil Challenge.

While this plays out, the judges are wondering if Michael hates Claire and that’s why he fled, and Claire stands there rubbernecking, and twisting her face into all sorts of ‘I dunno’ and ‘Why me’. Then Margarita leaves the stage to find Michael and she backs up his story about TapeMeasureGate. She tells Tim this is not about not liking Claire’s look, or even the fact that she’s copying other people’s designs, but that she’s cheating.

Onstage, Batani and Kenya, and Kentaro with a wry look, tell the judges that there was a “situation” with Claire’s top, to which Claire exclaims:

“Did she think I knocked off her top from the last challenge?”

Funny that came right out of her mouth if she didn’t know she was copying Margarita’s look. But the best was Kenya looking toward the heavens and saying:

“You did!”

Backstage, Michael explains to Tim that he’s seen Claire’s retractable ruler and that she writes notes on paper or her hands and brings the measurements into the workroom.

And Tim Gunn will not have that, but ... onstage Michael says he ran off because he couldn’t stand there and listen to a win he didn’t feel was deserved; Claire’s mouth gapes open like a dead flounder. Guest judge Yolanda Hadid snippily asks:

“Are you a judge in this show or are you a participant?”

Heidi shuts it down by explaining that it’s not against the rules to borrow from one another; they just aren’t allowed to use the internet and Michael snaps:

“There is no need for internet when you brought the pieces you’re ripping off.”

Yolanda tries to Kumbaya the situation and I tried throwing a shoe at the TV but then Heidi stifles everyone by telling them that Claire has won and that’s that; and then she gives Batani an Aufing.

Claire tries to say she doesn’t care about the win because she’s so frustrated that people think she’s been ripping off her own clothes and she feels like she been hit by  a truck, and then she heads backstage.

In the waiting room, Margarita tells Claire:

“At the end of the day, it was a print challenge, and you had a beautiful print.”

And that’s that ... except, when Michael comes into the waiting room, he apologizes to Claire for how he handled the situation; she says she wished he would have talked to her first and then, perhaps because she’s a lying cheater, Claire outs herself to the group.

Enter Tim Gunn ...

“First things first: Claire, is it true that you’ve had a measuring tape in your room?”

She won’t look at him:

“I have a measuring tape.”

“Is it true that you’ve been measuring garments in your room?”

She still won’t make eye contact:

“I have measured a tank top and I have measured the crotch of a pair of pants.”

Tim then says:

“Get the f**k outta my workroom you untalented hack.”

Oh, that was me; Tim said:

“All right, Claire, we must rescind your win and send you home.”

And just like that, Twin Two, Cheating Claire joins her sister, Sobbing Shawn, in the Auf’d category. And once her stank is out of the room, Tim tells the other designtestants that there will be no winner for this challenge, no money given out, but that Dixie will use Brandon’s print for free on their cups!

Score for Dixie!

Tim also tells Batani that she will be staying and I’m exhausted and yet there’s still a whole show to recap ...

The next day the runway has little girls and dolls and tea parties all around when the designtestants show up and then Tim explains that this will be a Shopkins Challenge and I’m thinking I’m old because I’ve no clue what a Shopkins is.

Well, Shopkins has created “Shoppies,” which are dolls that also collect Shopkins, which are little bits of plastic goodies or somesuch. And the girls in the room are Shoppie superfans, and each one, and their Shoppie dolls, will be paired with a designer to create an avant-garde look.

I thought:

“Avant-garde looks for kids.”

Then I realized that it was the kids and the Shoppies as inspirations for their model’s to rock an avant-garde look.

So, let’s rip ...

THE SAFES

KENYA It’s really pretty but is it avant-garde? Nope. She'd said something about 'tendrils' but I guess they didn't make the cut.

KENTARO I’m getting Ballerina Bridal though I do love the sculpted skirt.

TOPS AND BOTTOMS

BRANDON

Brandon’s superfan loves chocolate and wants chocolate melted all over the dress and Brandon freaks out; at Mood he cannot even go to the brown section and instead heads for a pastel green and beige area.

He is all kinds of worried because he’s never done avant-garde before and this makes Michael giddy; even Kenya snarks that maybe The Golden Boy will go down. Even Tim, though, is worried, because Brandon seems lost and his look appears too simple. Tim then gives him an idea for creating a stackable dress and Brandon is off.

WHAT HE SAID

She looks stunning. It’s avant-garde. It’s out there. It has a great silhouette. It’s clean.

WHAT I SAID

He stepped up a bit, and I do love the silhouette, but is it avant-garde?

WHAT THE JUDGES SAID

Zac Posen called it sophisticated and cool, and loves the cuffs on the skirt; he’s also glad that Brandon stayed true to his POV while going a little avant-garde.

Guest Judge, model Kate Upton, loved the color and the strap detail at the neck.

Nina Garcia loved that she could see Brandon’s “language” through the clothes.

Heidi thought it was a cool winner.

BATANI

Batani’s Shoppie was Pepper-Mint, and her superfan wanted something in blue with flowers and lots of color, which is right up Batani’s alley, meaning it’ll be great, or ...

Tim loves the color, and the print, and the ideas, but when Batani mentioned some sort of one-winged gimmick idea, he puts the kibosh on that. Batani then rethinks and, well ...

WHAT SHE SAID

I love my dress, the color, the volume.

WHAT I SAID

It’s oh-so-short under splotches of fabric that seem haphazardly sewn together.

WHAT THE JUDGES SAID

Heidi is not loving it; she calls it scraps sewn together and says it looks unfinished. And she hates how the too-short black skirt can be seen, and thinks that was a mistake.

Nina Garcia says it looks like Batani ran out of time, and also hates the mistake of the black skirt, even when Batani insists she wanted it like that.

Zac Posen said it wasn’t working and called it “laundry day”. He also hated the weird cut-out in the back.

Kate Upton says there’s an art to deconstruction construction, but this isn’t it.

AYANA

I fear for Ayana because she says she is tired of being in Safe Mode and she doesn’t care if she’s in the Bottom as long as she gets some feedback.

And she might get more than that when she shows Tim her idea of pleats and ruffles and giant bows in pinks and yellows and polka dots and tulle.

Tim orders her to edit, so she scraps one bow and then sets about making a hoop-skirt-dress out of chicken wire. Chicken.Wire.  Like I said, I fear for her.

WHAT SHE SAID

Liris is elegant and classy and sexy, even in this.

WHAT I SAID

I lovelovelove it. It’s totally avant-garde and Liris worked it.

WHAT THE JUDGES SAID

Kate Upton calls it says the look is a showstopper and loves the entire look.

Heidi loves the imagination, the bows, the color, the volume; the bigness of it all won her over.

Zac Posen dubs it “Surrealist Bo Peep”  and calls it fun and expressive , and loved the weird dotted leggings.

Nina Garcia said it was sophisticated but childlike at the same time and was all about the bow ... especially that Liris’ hair was combed into another bow!.

MARGARITA

Margarita’s Shopkins superfan wanted an Oscar dress in glitter and sparkles and she took that idea and twisted it into a cloud.

She took some actual packing materials and used that to mold some of the sequined fabrics into sculptural pieces which Tim really loved.

WHAT SHE SAID

It’s literally a dream, sparkly and soft.

WHAT I SAID

I love the sculptural quality to it, but I wish there’s been some color to it.

WHAT THE JUDGES SAID

Heidi loves it, calling it “beyond stunning ... like a cloud” coming down the runway. She also loved that, despite the volume, you could still see the model’s shape.

Kate loved all the different textures and textiles.

Zac Posen called it sensual and emotional and loved how the fabrics spoke for themselves.

Nina Garcia called it a “360 explosion.”

AMY

Amy is a very simple, but effective designer, and her Shopkins superfan liked the idea that the Shopkins are like puzzle piece that come on and off to create a look; so Amy tried to do that.

Tim, however, is confused; he likes it from the hips up, but from the hips down, and called one fabric “old pantyhose.”

Not a good look.

WHAT SHE SAID

It looks simple [but] it looks like my design character.

WHAT I SAID

It’s kinda sloppy looking and not at all avant-garde, except for, maybe, the wild collar.

WHAT THE JUDGES SAID

Heidi was not a fan, especially when she compared it to the others.

Zac Posen said it wasn’t risky enough to be avant-garde.

Nina Garcia also agreed that Amy should have taken her aesthetic of streamlined design and pushed it more.

Kate Upton loved the collar and thought that it would so “something” but it didn’t.

MICHAEL

His superfan was all about disco and Michael was on it: disco ball. I thought it might be a bit too literal, but then he told Tim it would be like a disco ball melting.

Tim went for it, but said if it was to be made all in one sequined fabric, it had better be perfectly constructed.

WHAT HE SAID

There’s so much refinement in my work.

WHAT I SAID

There were so many lumps and bumps and balls, it looked like a Disco Goiter.

WHAT THE JUDGES SAID

Nina Garcia called it well-made, fantastic and sci-fi, with a futuristic peplum.

Kate Upton wanted to wear it dancing.

Heidi loved that it looked good from every angle, and makes the model spin and spin and spin!

Zac Posen called it liquid and melting and Sensual Tin Man; he loved the imagination Michael used.

Heidi announces that Kenya and Kentaro are safe, but tells the other designers that “one ... or ... more of you will be out.”

Uh oh. She also says there are four Tops and two Bottoms this week—and that number doesn’t work well in any situation. She then gives Michael the win, gives Brandon, Ayana and Margarita the safes.

Batani is out ... again.

And Amy gets Auf’d too.

I agree with the Aufings, but the win, for me, should have been Ayana’s. Her looks was startling and cool and odd and avant-garde all the way; Michael’s was a sequined jumpsuit with some lumps and bumps.

Michael claims it wasn’t his intention to get Claire kicked off, but as a PR fan, I remember back to the early days when another contestant got the boot for bringing design books with them, so, yeah, Michael there’s a precedent.

And Margarita claiming she didn’t man to stir up all this mess, even though she kvetched about it ad nauseum in the workroom all day? Gurl, please.

LINES OF THE NIGHT go to Kentaro, first for this exchange with Kenya:

“Kenya, would you join us in the sauna.”

He pronounces it sow-na. Kenya says:

“What?”

Kentaro:

“Sow-na!”

Kenya:

“Salmon?”

Kentaro:

“Santa! Santa Claus! Merry Christmas!”

Kentaro also scored with the line he uttered at the end of the work day as everyone headed out:

“Don’t bring tape measure!”

Too late for Claire. Tee-hee.

Heidi gets a Runner-up nod for Line of the Night with this one to Batani:

“As I always say, in fashion, one day you are in, and the next day you’re out. And then you’re back in again!”

Wait. Posen has a cookbook, Cooking With Zac? Hey Zac, as you often tell the designtestants, focus on what you’re good at, m’kay?

Claire proved herself both a liar and a loser, because you saw the moment she admitted to having a tape measure, she was outta there. Her facial expression of faux shock and awe were just like her clothes: stolen and faux.

As for The Tents, I’m still seeing Brandon and Kentaro; Margarita has come up again, as has Michael. Kenya was too safe this week, but the stunner was Ayana; if she keeps this up, she could be a contender.

Next week? Another Unconventional Challenge and Claire and Shawn return ...

I kid about that last bit.

What did YOU think?