PR All-St★rs 4 Ep 10: Separation Anxiety

All right, this week we’re gonna keep it simple, because I have a lot to say …

Here’s the deal: Alyssa and Lisa Robertson from QVC — who seems to be made from some sort of plastic material, with perfectly spackled make-up —  tell the designtestants that this week’s challenge is to design separates — two items that can be worn together or … yes … separately — plus a fashion-forward version of that look. As a bonus, QVC will manufacture one design, one separate, to be sold as part of their G.I.L.I. line.

The designers have $300 per total and one day to make it work, so let’s rip …

THE TOPS

DMITRY 

As always. Dmitry does what Dmitry wants, and he wants to dress every woman in neoprene and lace because, well, he’s Dmitry and he knows best.

WHAT ZANNA SAID 

The Ready-To-Wear is too extreme, so he’s really going to have to push the fashion Forward look to make them stand apart.

WHAT HE SAID

Ready-To-Wear: Who would have thought … neoprene and lace?

Fashion Forward: It has a beauty about it.

WHAT I SAID

Ready-To-Wear: What Every Woman is going to wear some midriff-bearing wrap jacket made of rubber, er, neoprene? And the lace looks like an afterthought to tie the two looks together. Beautiful? Yes. Well-crafted? Always. But not suited to the challenge.

Fashion Forward: I loathe this dress. I see the jagged hem of the short dress through the lace and it looks like a Wilma Flintstone dress under there. I loathe.

WHAT THE JUDGES SAID

The Beautiful Georgina Chapman™ thinks he’s done a fabulous job, but feels the Fashion Forward look is more accessible — i.e. wearable — than his Ready-To-Wear. Isaac disagrees with her and says neither look is Fashion Forward and that they are just two “pretty dresses.” Lisa Robertson loves the yellow number, but thinks it’s far too short — and yet not a word about the jagged hem, while George Kotsiopoulos said Dmitry nailed it and both are beautiful and versatile. Alyssa didn’t really say he’d completed the challenge as much as she complimented him on his skill set.

WHAT HAPPENED

Dmitry's safe.

HELEN 

She doesn’t do Ready-To-Wear; she makes gowns, and only gowns. Michelle is sure this challenge will be Helen’s undoing, and Helen agrees, saying she’s in Fashion Purgatory — which I think looks like the Half-Off Bin at Wal-Mart.

WHAT ZANNA SAID

She likes the color combination on the RTW look, but worries that the Fashion Forward piece reads a little ‘Morticia.’

WHAT SHE SAID

Ready-To-Wear: So sweet, super cute, fun and flirty.

Fashion Forward: So fashion forward.

WHAT I SAID

Ready-To-Wear:  It is just so precious, but is it something a woman over forty—hell, over thirty—would wear? And if it makes a teeny model look a little wide, how is it gonna look on a curvy gal?

Fashion Forward: Another freakin’ cape-let. On her season, Helen was all about the cape, and here she is calling another cape Fashion Forward.

WHAT THE JUDGES SAID

The Beautiful Georgina Chapman™ thinks it’s a wonderful job, and loves the colors of the RTW look. George, though, said the separates don’t really work on all body types—which is the QVC customer after all—while Isaac called the Fashion Forward look both amazing, and the more sellable to the two looks. Alyssa wants the Fashion Forward look, to wear, and then throw in a box until her daughter is twenty—and would then presumably wear it to a Halloween party? Lisa Robertson said the Fashion Forward dress is so beautiful, it blinds you to how unattractive the RTW look seems to be.

WHAT HAPPENED

Helen's safe.

SONJIA

I didn’t know this before, but Sonjia doesn’t really so much as sketch as much as she walks through Mood waiting for a fabric to inspire her. M’kay, um, yeah, not the best idea I guess.

And because she does this she loses time and ends up throwing some yellow fabric on the ground and cutting holes in it and then throwing it on a model, and then cutting squares in it. M’kay, um, yeah, not the best idea I guess.

WHAT ZANNA SAID

She likes the RTW dress, but worries that Sonjia always makes a pencil skirt — and will become The Pencil Skirt Lady; she has no opinion on the Fashion Forward because there’s no design, and no dress when she visits the workroom.

WHAT SHE SAID

Ready-To-Wear: It’s delicate and feminine and strong.

Fashion Forward: This girl has got it going on.

WHAT I SAID

Ready-To-Wear: It grew on me — even though it’s still a pencil skirt. I could see it working together and working as separates.

Fashion Forward: To me, this is a mess. It’s a bag, a yellow bag, with some squares cut into it to link it to the RTW look, with a grey coat in RTW fabric thrown over it to further make the looks seem cohesive.

WHAT THE JUDGES SAID

Isaac thought the RTW was “beyond” and gorgeous; he also loved the cutouts and the lace. The Beautiful Georgina Chapman™ thinks the yellow dress would work better flipped around; she loathes the dress, but admits Sonjia is the only one who nailed the separates part of the challenge. Alyssa says “YES. YES. YES.” to both looks. Lisa Robertson loves the edginess of the Fashion Forward piece, while George also felt Sonjia was the best at creating separates.

WHAT HAPPENED

Sonjia wins.

THE BOTTOMS

MICHELLE 

She makes separates! She designs for the Every Woman! This is in her wheelhouse — a phrase she uses far too often and almost always signals, if not a death knell, a Bottom Three Knell.

WHAT ZANNA SAID

She worries that the RTW needs more versatility, and that the hot pants beneath the Fashion Forward look border on tacky.

WHAT SHE SAID

Ready-To-Wear: It looks effortless … wicked cool.

Fashion Forward: The sleeves are just wonderful.

WHAT I SAID

Ready-To-Wear: I like Michelle, I do, but this looks Circus clown to me from the print, to the shape to the styling. All it needs are some big shoes and a red nose.

Fashion Forward: If all you’ve got going are wonderful sleeves that should be the first sign that it’s not enough. It looks like pajamas … old lady granny panties pajamas.

WHAT THE JUDGES SAID

Isaac hates the print and calls it “Duty free” — whatever that means, though maybe he meant, as I thought, ‘doody’? Just sayin’. The beautiful Georgina Chapman™ is not sure she likes the print, but she does like the attitude of the looks. Lisa Robertson was so flummoxed she couldn’t say whether she loved them or hated them, while George said he loves a print — even that print George? — and says both looks are Fashion forward. Alyssa thought the RTW skirt was overworked, but loved the romanticism of the Fashion Forward look.

WHAT HAPPENED

Michelle is safe.

FABIO

Fabio. Fabio. Fabio. I adore you so, but, seriously, your color palette is annoying. He liked nothing he saw at Mood—save for some white silk and baby blue leather—so he opted to dye his own fabrics, making his own textile; but, as usual, it’s pastel blue and the inevitable pink that he chooses.

WHAT ZANNA SAID 

She liked his dyed fabric but worried that both looks were too simple.

WHAT HE SAID

Ready-To-Wear: A true example of the kind of woman I want to dress.

Fashion Forward: Something really, really classic.

WHAT I SAID

Ready-To-Wear: This is cute. I loved the play of the leather front, and the hand-painted fabric in the back, and while a skort sounds scary to me, it looks cute … and young.

Fashion Forward: I like the fabric—though I loathe the colors—but how is this at all Fashion Forward and how does it relate to the Ready-To-Wear piece? I think Fabio suffer from Dmitry-it is, too, in that he does what he wants and then tries to fake it into the challenge parameters.

WHAT THE JUDGES SAID

George says the Fashion Forward dress feels cute, a little young, but not Fashion Forward, while Alyssa liked the skort and leather top, thinking they would both sell.  The Beautiful Georgia Chapman™ thought the dress needed either less or more. Lisa Robertson liked the skort, loved the leather, but felt it was just all too simple. Isaac, though, was not amused; he thought the Fashion Forward look was over-thought, and felt both pieces were irrelevant.

WHAT HAPPENED

He's safe, though not before Isaac says, “Fabio? You’ve been in the bottom a lot. Don’t do it again.”

JAY

He does only Ready-To-Wear, and yet he struggles; he struggles because he always wants to do more, make more, do extra, because he thinks that will win, when all it does it force him to make a lot of crap pieces.

He cannot find the perfect fabric at Mood, so he just fills a basket with all kinds of stuff, and then goes back to the workroom and makes about a hundred different outfits.

WHAT ZANNA SAID 

She hates the fabric he chose for the pants on the Ready-To-Wear look, and thinks the design of his Fashion Forward piece — he has nothing done on that one — appears more wearable.

WHAT HE SAID

Ready-To-Wear: I’m happy. That’s all that matters.

Fashion Forward: It’s really relaxed and easy.

WHAT I SAID

Ready-To-Wear: look, if all you say about your look is that you like it and nothing else matters, you’ve already packed your bags to go home. And if it’s raining, use the pants to protect you from the elements.

Fashion Forward: A freaking mullet dress, covered in pleats, that looks both heavy and too short and not enough. Use that to hail a cab for the airport, Jay.

WHAT THE JUDGES SAID

George says the pants look messy because the fabric is just the worst. Alyssa loves the RTW top, but that’s not saying a lot. The Beautiful Georgina Chapman™ said the trousers — don’t you just love a Brit who says trousers or is that just me — are bad, and feels like Jay has already given up. Lisa Robertson loved the color and draping of the Fashion Forward piece, while Isaac called it heavy and wrong and short.

WHAT HAPPENED

In short, Jay's out.

MY TAKE

I called Jay’s exit last week, though I’ll miss the Cutie Patootie.

The best line of the night — other than Isaac’s smack to Fabio — is from Sonjia, who listened as Jay talked about making three or four pieces for his RTW look:

“It’s too many pieces. You can only do two. Two, hunty, not three.”

The runner-up is Michelle, for her comment on Jay’s RTW pants:

“I think he took a table cloth and made a pair of pants. Which is good if you’re eating ribs.”

Fabio needs to stop with the pink and the simple and the plain if he wants a spot in the finale. I so like him and his aesthetic, but this Pink Period is just getting old. I wish they’d create a challenge where each designer cannot do something they’ve already done:

No pink for Fabio.

No form fitting dress from Dmitry.

Lose the pencil and create a sketch, Sonjia

Cut the wackadoo prints from Michelle.

Stop with the cape-lets for Helen.

Then maybe we’d get something good from these people.

As it stands now, it’s Dmitry and Sonjia at The Tents — or whatever is passing for The Tents now — with Helen up there, too. Michelle may go next, if Fabio doesn’t snap out it.

What did YOU think?