Project Runway Season Six, Episode Eight: Gay Divorcees!

Sorry for posting so late but I just had a garage sale and it took three full days of my life. I didn't make much money but I got rid of a lot of stuff, including many items too bulky for me to transport to a charity shop myself. So it was a success. I am so exhausted I can barely move.

Anyway, last time on Project Runway the designers were asked to create something old, something new, something borrowed, and something blue. The twist was that the look had to be old without looking dated, new without being edgy, borrowed without looking copied, and blue without actually being blue. Irina won and Louise was out.

We start the episode with Logan frying bacon. I'm going to start the controversial rumor that it is actually turkey bacon. I know I will get a lot a hate-mail over this but I just think it was too flat for regular bacon. Regular bacon gets all curly and shrinks up when you fry it. It must be turkey bacon, right? What kind of man's man would eat turkey bacon? You be the judge.

However, this is the one time I'm glad Logan is wearing a shirt. Because splattering grease can be really painful. The only thing worse than frying bacon shirtless is frying bacon pantless. Trust me.

Irina has decided that everyone is talking about her behind her back:

Irina: "Everyone is jealous because I'm so talented. And pretty."

What evidence do you have of this?

Irina: "They are all smiling and being nice to me. Obviously they all hate me."

Right. So I'm starting to think Irina is psychotic but then Logan confirms her theory:

Logan: "Irina is much more talented than the rest of us. I don't know why she's acting like she's better than the rest of us."

Heidi introduces us to the gay divorcees:

Heidi: "These women aren't actually gay but their dresses sure are! What the hell were they thinking? These women were all recently divorced. And by 'recently,' I mean within the past fifty years. They are ready to get on with their lives and start dating much younger men. Your challenge is to take these tragic wedding dresses and turn them into even more tragic cocktail dresses."

I love this challenge! It's specific, difficult, and makes sense. The symbolism of destroying your wedding dress to mark the end of your marriage and turning it into something new to mark the beginning of your new life makes a lot of sense. Of course, a couple of the women have been divorced for decades so I hope they got on with their lives a long time ago. But for the most part I think this is an excellent challenge.

Let's see how they can screw up this challenge, shall we?

Tim: "You'll get to buy two yards of fabric at Mood."

WHY?!!! Why ruin the challenge? Just use the wedding dress. It's not that complicated. You can make an entire outfit with two yards of fabric so it defeats the purpose of challenge. Well, fortunately, most of the designers end up using the wedding dress for the majority, if not the entirety, of the new look. Which begs the question: what was the point of that distraction? All the results would have been better and the challenge would have been more streamlined if they had just skipped the visit to Mood.

The designers meet with their divorcees:

The divorcee Nicolas is working with wants him to work with materials that are cruelty free:

Divorcee: "I don't want any animals to suffer because of this outfit."

Nicolas: "Don't worry. My clothes only cause human suffering."

Shirin is already complaining about her lack of material and her inability to dye polyester, when she then has to deal with her divorcee's demands, which are so ridiculous I can only assume the producers of the show have put her up to it:

Divorcee: "I want a huge peacock-feather headdress!"

No, she doesn't. Nobody wants a huge peacock-feather headdress. This whole storyline is complete bullshit.

We learn more of Gordana's story:

Gordana: "I was married before I got divorced."

Yeah, that's usually how it works.

The producers arrange a very emotional telephone call between Gordana and an answering machine. Seriously, this is the first time she's been allowed to call her children and nobody bothered to find out if her children were home? I don't understand how these calls work but this was pretty sucky.

Epperson completely screws up the challenge. First he decides to use as little of the wedding dress as possible. Then when Tim tells him the challenge was to use the wedding dress, he ends up making something that used as much of the dress as possible. He couldn't seem to grasp the concept of taking the dress and making something new out of it.

Tim makes his rounds:

Tim: "Irina, how did you get this beautiful grey color?"

The same way everyone else got that grey color. By trying to dye the fabric black. That's what man-made fabrics look like when you try dye them black. I know this because when I went through my mandatory goth period, I tried to dye all my clothes black. The color she got is pretty, though.

Tim helps Shirin with her meltdown:

Tim: "Shirin, that dress is awful. And that trim you bought disturbs me. And what the hell are you wearing? I hate those shoes."

Shirin: "You aren't supposed to help me have a meltdown. You are supposed to help me work through my meltdown."

Tim: "In that case, I think you should start making paper dolls."

In the final fittings Nicolas decides that his is the most hideous outfit he has ever made. And that's saying a lot.

Epperson tells us that all the women said he should win. Interestingly, we don't hear anyone actually say it.

Logan thinks his look is a disaster. He's right.

The judges are Micheal Kors, some woman from Marie Claire, and the founder of Jimmy Choo.

Irina made a very pretty lace dress. It's a huge transformation from the wedding dress and this woman could definitely wear it to dinner or a party. However, I'm still getting a wedding vibe from it; it feels a little "mother of the bride" to me.

Shirin made a pretty little white dress. Well, perhaps "made" is too strong a word. She really just shortened the wedding dress and adding a cool pattern of stitching to it. And I love the stitching but I can only see it in close-ups. I think it's a cute dress but it doesn't feel transformed to me.

Logan made another horrible, unflattering pant. He paired the pant with a horrible, unflattering top. And while both pieces were horrible and unflattering, they somehow still didn't go together. I think if he had made a jacket instead of that weird vest, the look might have worked.

Carol Hannah made a very cute dress with bands of fringe made from the tulle skirt. I don't know why she added that strange little black shrug. But I really like the dress.

Althea made a really bizarre garment that looked like a dark blue bra worn over a light blue dress. The accentuated bust line paired with a belt at the natural waist, chopped up the body. There was too much going on with this look.

Nicolas made an outfit with a pant, vest, and cap-sleeved jacket. I think it's a pretty good look.

Nicolas: "I hate this outfit. But you can't make beautiful gowns and cocktail dresses all the time."

Or, in your case, ever.

Gordana made a gorgeous dress from the lining of the wedding dress. This dress is perfect. It's very flattering and it's exactly what her divorcee wanted.

Christopher screwed up. I appreciate what he was going for. His sketch was adorable. And the finished dress looks like the sketch. But the finished dress is definitely not adorable. Part of the problem is the fabrication. It's too cheap and shiny. The other problems are that the dress is too short and it is not age-appropriate. A woman in her twenties might be able to pull off this dress. But theoretically, this was not a terrible idea and I don't think it is an aufable offense.

Epperson just did not get this challenge. And he made a dress that couldn't be worn anywhere. It was too dressy to wear during the day and too dated to wear at night. The skirt was way to full. He seems to just have added a black and white corset thing to the shortened wedding dress. And what was with the completely redundant shrug? The outfit didn't look any different when it was removed.

Gordana wins! She totally deserved it!

Heidi: "You did a good job . . . this time."

Wow, Heidi, that was subtle. We get it. You think she sucks.

Epperson explains that he didn't understand the challenge:

Heidi: "I thought I was perfectly clear when I explained the challenge."

Oh, Heidi, you've never been perfectly clear when you've explained a challenge.

Logan and Epperson are the bottom two.

Epperson is out. Sorry Epperson. Epperson created some great looks but I agree with the judges that he had the weakest look this time.

Major model drama again this week! Spoilers for Models of the Runway below so don't read on if you haven't seen this week's episode yet.

Because of the model shake-up last time, Gordana ended up with Matar and Althea ended up with Gordana's favorite model, Tara. But they didn't actually work with their new models yet because the divorcees were modeling this week. Gordana was able to pick models first because she won this challenge so she could have had Tara back. But for some reason she thought Althea wanted to have the chance to work with Tara. So Gordana decided that the best thing to do would be to stick with the last model pick because the models didn't get to participate in the last challenge. So she stayed with Matar. Makes sense, right? The only problem is that Althea didn't want to stay with Tara. She wanted to go back to Tanisha. And nobody picked Tara so Tara is out! Gordana had first pick and her favorite model is out! What a tragedy! Tara thought Gordana had said "I think I'm going to pick you" but we can't actually hear her so she may have said "Althea is going to pick you." Anyway, Tara is angry because she thinks Gordana lied to her and Gordana is crying because she's responsible for her favorite model being out and Althea, who probably caused the whole mess, is claiming she doesn't know what's going on.

Well, at least Celine always knows what to say to make everyone feel better:

Celine: "I'm a good farter."