Friday, July 17, 2009

The Fashion Show Finale Part One: This show could have used a wise Latina judge!

Kelly has a fashion tip for you: Apparently you should have some pants and white shirts and cashmere sweaters and pretty dresses. Now you have a wardrobe. You're welcome.

Kelly: "We started the season with fifteen designers. There were some amazing successes, like the time Anna created a garment that didn't completely suck. And there have been some huge failures, like the time Reco made that flaming dress that gave his model third-degree burns. Now we are down to four designers and it is completely in the hands of you, the viewers, to decide the winner. Oh, after we make one more elimination. Then it will be completely up to you. Except that we don't actually count the votes from the viewers. That would be a total pain in the ass. You won't know the difference."

Let's welcome our final four: Kenley, Kayne, Leanne, and Christian:

Kenley: "Making it to the final is so amazing. Especially for someone like me. Who grew up on a tugboat."

Christian: "This show is a hot tranny mess."

OK, so the real final four are: Daniella, Anna, Reco, and James-Paul:

Anna was inspired by a Bosch painting. You know, the ones with people being eaten by horrible monsters in hell. Oh, she's not doing the hell pictures? She doing The Garden of Earthly Delights? The painting about people enjoying all the sinful pleasures that will send them to hell? Very upbeat.

James-Paul was inspired by Australian aborigines dressed as cowboys. Or something like that.

Daniella was inspired by armor.

Reco was inspired by Aztec prostitutes.

Isaac: "In a few days you'll be presenting your looks at the biggest fashion show of your lives. And I don't just mean your lives so far. I mean this will be the highlight of your careers."

Wow, that was brutally honest.

Isaac: "We've invited the biggest names in the fashion industry! Unfortunately, they couldn't make it. But we did invite them."

We learn that one designer will be eliminated after the show so that the viewers only get to vote on three of the collections.

The models come in for the fittings. Daniella's models are too skinny and Reco's models are all too big for his stupid wedding dress. Why don't they trade models?

Daniella: "I prefer models to be skinny enough to make my tight clothes look baggy and terrible."

The designers are frantically making final preparations for the runway:

Daniella: "Has anyone seen Elizabeth?"

Some Gay Hairstylist: "Uh, you'll have to be more specific. All hair and makeup people are named Elizabeth. It's the law. Would you hand me the Tresemme Shine Spray, Elizabeth? Thanks."

Daniella: "Well, someone tell Elizabeth I requesting Soft Robot and instead I got Sexy Cat. What's wrong with you people? Since when does a soft robot look like a cat?"

Never. A soft robot has never looked like a cat. Elizabeth should know that.

Time for the show:

Daniella: "My collection is so soft robot. I had to live in a bathroom. I wrote this song."

Daniella's collection was mostly black and cream, with a lot of leather and tight pants. I liked the chain-mail pieces a lot. The shoulder details really tied the looks together. I thought it was a good collection but I wasn't blown away.

Reco: "Tonight I introduce you to the high priestess of the Aztec Empire. My collection is so new. At least it seems that way to me because I haven't really been paying attention."

Reco's collection had a nice jacket. Seriously, that's the only thing I liked. He's an amazing craftsman but his designs are really dated. He thinks he's creating things nobody has seen before but that just demonstrates that he really needs to spend more time studying fashion history and looking at what other designers are doing. Because almost nothing in that collection was new or interesting. But, like I said, he makes beautifully crafted garments. I think he could have a pretty good career making one-off pieces for performers and beauty pageants.

Anna: "I'd like to thank my mother, Laura Bush."

Anna's collection used a lot of details from the season. Probably too many. Oh, and some details from Leanne's final collection. Anyway, I loved almost every piece. It wasn't as cohesive a collection as some of the others but I don't care. It's better than collections that are too cohesive because they are all black or all variations of the same dress.

James-Paul: "I was really inspired by indigenous people wearing Western clothes. It's futuristic because indigenous people are wearing what Western people wear but in a different way. Like they could wear a pair of pants as a hat."

Seriously, I think I understand what he means but he's saying it in the most convoluted way. I think what he means is that he's being inspired by the clothes of non-Western cultures that have been influenced by colonialism. So it's an influence of an influence. I like the concept better now that I've explained it to myself.

James-Paul's collection was all black and grey. His color palette is so boring. But I loved the collection. I don't think he was cut out for this show at all. I think he would have done better on Project Runway, where the designers can be a little more experimental. He just couldn't figure out what do for the challenges on this show. But, even though I thought he should have been eliminated several times during the season, his was the collection I was most looking forward to seeing. I wasn't disappointed. The ironic thing is that during the season, when he was supposed to be working on specific challenges for real women, he just produced art pieces that nobody could wear. But now that he had a full collection where he had the freedom to do anything he wanted to do, he created some really wearable pieces that would look good on many different body types. For example, his collection had the only pieces of the entire season that Fern Mallis would wear. That's a real woman.

The judges say that Anna's collection wasn't cohesive. They say that Daniella's models were too skinny. They say that Reco didn't do enough and yet he also needs to simplify. They say that James-Paul needs an instruction card to explain what the hell he's talking about.

Isaac: "We have a very difficult decision to make. Oh, who am I kidding? This is an easy decision."

Reco is out.

I am completely shocked . . . that the judges actually made the right decision. That's really not like them at all.

9 comments:

mumblesalot (Laura A) said...

"Reco was inspired by Aztec prostitutes." heh

Gold lame' looks so lame. I wish he could fall in love with some of the beautiful fabrics that are available.

Was Danielle's concept: strong women who are androgynously frail and wear soft robot makeup but have sexy shoulders...? I bet you would find manga comics under her bed.

I really liked JP's collection too but it did remind me of a Japanese designer....name? I cannot remember.

Thanks for the great laughs

Sewing Siren said...

I thought James Paul had the best collection, too.
Although it wasn't as new and revolutionary as he thought it was. Comme des Garcons (Rei Kawakubo) and Yohji Yamamoto are the two Japanese designers who's work from the 1980's that James-Paul's work reminds me of. Are they the ones you were trying to think of Laura A? He wasn't likable, so he probably won't win. I personally like people that frequently stick their foot in their mouth. Go figure.

Reco and Daniella would be better off if they would obsess less on each other and more of their design work.

Anna's was good. I thought the critique they gave her was kind of dumb and too harsh. She'll win it, if they really go by the popular vote.

Cliff O'Neill said...

100% agree with you!! Reco's collection was exactly what you said. He really needs to learn about other fashion designers, because he's just a really great pageant dressmaker right now.

And, now that he's eliminated, perhaps it won't be the popularity contest it would have so obviously been had he been in the final three.

(And thanks again for providing the script for my weekly dramatic reading o' the blog! It's always such a hit in the household here!)

eric3000 said...

Yes, I agree that James-Paul is definitely inspired by Japanese designers going back to the 1980s and his aesthetic is not completely original. But the important thing is that his clothes don't look dated.

I would really be happy with any of the final three winning.

mumblesalot (Laura A) said...

Thanks Sewing Siren.

Sewing Siren said...

I would like to clarify that when I wrote this:

"Although it wasn't as new and revolutionary as he thought it was."

The *he* I'm talking about is James-Paul.

I'm not even sure if it was unclear, but if it was I'm sorry.

eric3000 said...

Sewing Siren, I understood that you meant James-Paul thinks his aesthetic is more original than it really is. And I agree. That seems to be a common issue with young designers. But I think James-Paul is a little more familiar with his influences than some other young designers are.

Anonymous said...

Well, James-Paul's concept, "Indigenous People Wearing Western Clothing" was what James-Paul did do. Notice each pieces, they are all Western clothes. And his models were all indigenous people and had the look of indigenous. It was simple, people just over think of what he said. I do not think that James-Paul was Japanese aesthetic, because he did not do any of the techniques that the Japanese designers did, James-Paul was more Punk, Vivienne Westwood. And "indigenous People Wearing Western Clothing" was more specific than colonialism, because colonialism on his work are the effects of what Westerners do towards the indigenous, which is have the "Indigenous" wear Western clothing, colonialism as is was making it extremely general, so he made a collection that reflects of a setting for a group of types of people. James-Paul is a very socially conscious so his way is very original because he is socially challenging our views about people.

eric3000 said...

Thanks for your comment, anonymous. I thought James Paul's collection was the most interesting and it was my pick to win. But I think his concept was much more involved that simply putting Western clothes on ethnic models. He was talking about being influenced by the way non-Western cultures have adapted Western influences and made them their own. He's obviously interested in colonial and postcolonial theory. I don't think I'm overcomplicating or dismissing his concept. On the contrary, I think it's quite clear and ingenious.