PR 11 Ep 12: Euro Good and Euro Trash

When we last left the PR Michelle was Auf’d, or not. She was told by Heidi that, after failing the listen to Nina $%&#ing Garcia, that she was in a ‘Do or Die ... Last Chance’ situation, and we awaited her fate.

I thought she’d be forced to scrub Nina’s Upper East Side pied-a-tierre with a mascara brush, or something; carry Nina around New York on her back? Play Anne Hathaway to Nina’s Meryl Streep in a roadshow, live, version of The Devil Wears Prada?

No. Michelle gets the news after the show that she’s just in; and I thought there would be added punishment, like she would have to win this next challenge or be Auf’d for real. So, quelle surprise, it was just another producer trick to make sure Michelle gets to The Tents.

But, she does get punished in one way. When Heidi and Tim heard the designtestants back on the runway to explain that for this challenge—where they must create a high-end runway look on a budget of $1000—they will each be headed off to a European fashion capital while Michelle stays in New York and takes a bus tour of Brooklyn! So, that’s the punishment. Big Ow. But the viewers get punished, too, listening to Michelle whine and kvetch. And seeing her wearing an orange hat.

Oh.The.Humanity!!

Stanley gets London! Score! And he gets Richard as his assistant! Loss! Layana gets Samantha as her traveling companion to Barcelona, while Daniel and his sweatshop seamstress Amanda head off to Berlin. Patricia is paired with Kate and off they go to Paris. 

The others fly to Europe, get in a car, take pictures while racing through their cities, and then sketch for a minute, go to Fill in the blank of the European city Mood, fight with shop-girls and try to figure out how much a thousand bucks US will get you in Europe.

Answer: not that much.

Let’s rip ……

STANLEY

London! Mod! Hip! Swinging London! Okay, that was the 1960s, but still....

London! Punk! Sid and Nancy! Okay that was the 80s, but still …..

Westminster Abbey and Big Ben! What the .....

Stanley tells us that, as a child, he wanted to be a vampire….Blacula!...and so he keeps seeing a dark figure in the windows of the London Parliament buildings and so he’ll go dark. And simple. With a capelet.

Like a Goth superhero from the 1880s.

It was simple, I thought, too simple. And, was it just me, or did the model have trouble walking? Plus, she didn’t remove the cape on her catwalk so you never got a chance to see that the Sister Stanley Nun look had a rather sexy back.  And the hint of glamour, a sequined lining, could only be seen as the model walked away. I love Stanley; I have a mild to severe case of The Stanley's—and, in the words of the immortal Diana Ross, ‘I don’t need no cure.’—but I didn’t think this was all that.

Nina absolutely loved it! She loved the drama of the capelet, but also loved the luxe of the leather paillette lining. Heidi said it was high volume—Really?—but done simply; the girl looked strong. The Adorable Zac Posen™ said, ‘Bravo!’ and I said, ‘Wrong network!’ He called it elegant and surprising and loved the Sherlock Holmes cape—and now I get the cape! Guest judge, music icon John Legend, called it gorgeous and sleek and elegant.

Obviously they all saw something I didn’t but it got Stanley to The Tents and fed my lust. 

So, win-win.

DANIEL

Daniel gets the Cry Baby edit. He’s never been to Europe, he’s old—Hey, he said it first!—and he has that mustache which was flapping around in the Berlin breeze like a crow trying to escape his face.

Just sayin’.

But, Daniel was lucky to have been paired with Amanda because she was able to talk him down from his Grandma Aesthetic into something more youthful and modern. And, yes, pleather!  He goes for yet another jacket—though this time there are no Daniel Shoulders™--atop a black asymmetrical dress and hooker boots.

Yes, Hooker boots. He used some black leather, and some Oh Dear Lord & Taylor wedges, to create a leather boot and I thought it would be the end of him. But, they looked cool and edgy and really funked up—and not that other ‘f’ word—his design.

Nina thought he’d captured Berlin, especially having never been to Europe. She liked that it looked edgy and underground. She was in love with pleather—Nina $%&#ing Garcia! Who knew?—and thought the hooker boots made it a show-piece. John Legend—Is his voice made of silk, or what?—wasn’t a fan of the pleather, though he could see the Berlin architectural inspiration, but he loved the dress. The Adorable Zac Posen™ called him brave for daring to work with pleather—which he called humorous and odd—but was worried about his taste level in other challenges. Heidi, who said he could be an old fart, liked the young and modern edge.

Daniel’s last minute trip to Modern Town got him a Ticket to The Tents!

MICHELLE

Michelle got the Poor me edit this week. If she mentioned it once that she needed time ‘to heal’ she mentioned it a thousand times—and she mentioned it a thousand times so you do the math! I kept pausing the TV and looking at Carlos and saying, ‘She.Ignored.A.Direct.Order.From.Nina! She’s lucky she got a second chance and wasn’t instantly put to death!

Stop whining. You have another chance at The Tents instead of going back to Podunkville, or wherever, and getting more crop circles tattooed on your arms.

Heal me!

Michelle becomes inspired by the smoke patterns left on the sides of buildings by chimneys and fireplaces, and also the way the old is reflected in the windows of the new. So, that naturally says quilted leather breastplate.

You gotta give her credit for thinking outside the box.

And she slaps the harness—and you just know she has other ideas for that harness when she gets back to Podunkville—atop a gorgeous cashmere strapless number. And, to replicate the look of the soot on the buildings she uses fabric paint to dirty up the bottom of the dress. Trouble is, it isn’t enough to look intentional, and it looks more like Layana snatched the dress off the dummy—and I’m not talking the model, I mean the actual dummy—and dragged it to Brooklyn and back herself.

Nina dubbed the look a comeback and said it had the NYC spirit; she loved the patent leather breast-plate and who knew Nina rolled like that? John Legend loved the swing of the cashmere dress and the unexpected splash of leather. The Adorable Zac Posen™ called it very luxe, and thought the Dusty Bottom—Is that the name on his Grindr account?—was a brave move. Heidi was less than thrilled about the smudged soot and thought it looked like a ‘dirty horsey blanky.’

But they all agreed that—big surprise—Michelle deserved to be at The Tents.

PATRICIA

You could see Patricia holding her breath as Heidi announced which Auf’d designers would be their assistants. And, if they had the nerve to pair her with Richard again I might have put a size 11 shoe through my TV. But, luckily for her she got Kate, and luckily for us, Kate didn’t talk much.

The two jet off to Paris where Patricia, the artist, is more drawn to the graffiti along the streets than she is to the romanticism of Paris. She wouldn’t do sweet, City of Lights, she would do some arty graffiti textile that is more her aesthetic. It was a risk, but Patricia isn’t all girly romance; she’s more the take a risk because she’s creating an art piece. But she does struggle in the workroom by trying to create this layered poster, and graffiti and wall art effect by layering fabric atop fabrics, and then putting it on top of a modified pair of over-alls.

Yes, I said over-alls. Luckily Tim talks her out of it—the two pieces don’t look like they belong together—and she makes the Graffiti Coat more of a top, over a basic black pant. But there were issues with the color, which seemed limp and lifeless, and the sleeves, though as I watched them, I began to like their odd shape.

The Adorable Zac Posen™ called it ‘Trash Couture’ and, well, it sounded bad, but I get what he meant by it; not bad, but not really so good. He appreciates her textiles—the decoupage graffiti—but said the top looked messy and dumpy and lumpy. Nina was underwhelmed, which is never good, and called it ‘cotton candy gone wrong.’ She didn’t see Paris in the collage, papier-mâché art project. John Legend simply said it didn’t work, and the pants are too blah for the top, but Heidi liked the unusual-ness of the look, though she agreed that the pants were wrong. She said she could rock that look on the cover of Marie Claire and Nina bitch-slapped her.

The fight for, and against, Patricia was on. Heidi wanted to see what creative textiles she could show, and Nina said she didn’t want an arts-and-crafts runway; Heidi was intrigued by the crazy and Nina said Patricia was good at textiles but not design.

Naturally, though, Heidi got her way, and Patricia got the fourth slot at The Tents. But, I think she may have to scrub Nina’s Upper East Side pied-a-tierre with a mascara brush, or something; or carry Nina around New York on her back; or play Anne Hathaway to Nina’s Meryl Streep in a roadshow, live, version of The Devil Wears Prada.

But it might be worth it.

LAYANA

Layana goes to Barcelona in the shortest shorts I’ve ever seen; and suddenly I’m like an old woman, shrieking, ‘Put some clothes on!’

But she trolls the streets of Barcelona, marveling at the architecture, and the beautiful tiles and all the detail in every building and that’s where she becomes inspired. 

Tiles. Spanish tiles. So, naturally, she takes the exuberance of the Spanish tiles, in all their glorious colors, and creates a black-and-white ‘housecoat’—Heidi was right about that—with an old lady length and some pink bits of Kleenex hanging out of each sleeve.

It wasn’t Barcelona, it was barf alone. It was sad, and old—perhaps because Layana was inspired by the ‘old’ architecture. But, no matter what the judges said, and no matter that Nina had to be restrained when she saw the pink sleeves, Layana keeps saying she loves the look, and that she’d wear it. She’s trying to be a good salesperson but you can’t sell sh*t to a manure manufacturer.

The Adorable Zac Posen™ loved the choice of materials—and got the tile reference—but called the sleeves an eyesore; he loved the outfit better without the jacket, because the blouse has some romantic Spanish quality to it and the jacket was too buttoned-up. Nina saw his eyesore and raised him a “Those sleeves! Why-y-y-y … why-y-y?” She called it old-fashioned and said it lacked the color and passion of Barcelona; plus, the styling was matronly. Heidi added that the model, in her housecoat and bad hair looked like Layana’s mama; there was no sex, and we all know Heidi loves The Sexy. John Legend wrote a song about the look and called it “Not Hot.”

Layana got the Auf’ing I’d been waiting for, and then gave us the ‘What will I tell my mom?’ weepy exit. I say, tell your mom you made her a Spanish housecoat and leave it at that.

MY TAKE

The whole Oooh, is Michelle in or out? What will she have to do to deign again? Nonsense annoyed me. It was clearly a producer ploy to get Michelle at Fashion Week.

What’s up with Daniel’s hair in the previews for next week? Is his moustache staging a coup on his head?

Stanley. I love you.

Patricia and Tim seem like they have a moment next week.

Hopefully this week is the last we see of Richard and his walnut Head. I was so happy he was Auf’d and then he was like my Cousin Shirley at Thanksgiving: he never left. G’home already.

What did YOU think?