PR: Even Designers Get the Blues

 

Loved this episode, if for no other reason than that it marks the departure of sour-faced Victorya. That really was an awful outfit and didn't look very altered (third from the right). She's obviously got  designer chops but I lost  respect for her when photos emerged online showing that her winning dress in the prom challenge was a straightforward ripoff of a dress a former PR designer (Michael Knight) created for a tv show. Now I'm reading that Victorya somehow scored her own show at Fashion Week, so that'll be interesting to see. Fashion Week is in about two weeks, and images of the PR shows will be available at Getty Images nearly instantaneously for us PR junkies to obsess over until the finale finally airs...

Anyway, back to this week's episode, in which the designers were to create an original iconic look using only Levi's 501 jeans, jean jackets and white cotton (presumably the stuff they make pockets out of). They were given lots of additional Levi's notions like huge cones of ochre thread, fly buttons and those little red Levi's flags.

I was happy for Ricky, the winner, but I didn't think his dress was the best one (third from the left, in the photo above). It was definitely Ricky's best work, though, and in closeups you can see all the great seaming in the bodice.

I thought Rami's dress (left) was really sharp. He did the exposed zipper thing like Jeffrey did on that green striped dress in his runway collection last season, and I thought the whole thing had nice lines. It was different from everything else Rami has constructed this season, too, so that was refreshing.

I also loved Sweet P's smart patchwork dress (below). Michael Kors said it has "the voodoo," meaning the placement of the dark fabrics provides instant visual slimming, that most desired and most elusive quality! P was smart to hack off the bottom of her planned gown to make it a short dress. My only quibble is that the whole 501 jeans thing is about the button fly, am I right? And her dress doesn't have any buttons on it, so while I think it is the most wearable and the cutest, it does not fulfill the challenge brief as well as some others do (Rami and Christian -- the only look with pants, above -- both knocked it out of the park in that sense).

Sweet P has done great work several weeks in a row and I would love to see her at Fashion Week, but for some reason I don't get a sense from the editing that she is going all the way... We'll see.

Michael Kors made some really good points this week. Along with the "voodoo" comment about P's dress, he commented on the slightly frayed touches on Chris' dress, saying he should have pushed it and done it all over. That's something that all visual artists could learn from. Whatever quirky thing you decide to leave in, make it look intentional and make it look like it belongs there. Don't leave the viewer any opportunity to think of your quirky touch as an oversight or a mistake. Own it!

So we're down to six designers, which was the point at which they made a field trip to Paris last season. I wonder what is in store for us this time?