Project Runway Season Eleven, Episode Ten: HPmaster Cycle!

Heidi: “In this episode you will be going to the Guggenheim Museum!”

Welcome to the Guggenheim!

Tim: “That’s right. This is the HP avant garde challenge. It's really your opportunity to push the boundaries and create readable art!”

Ooh, I'm an avant garde blogger, so this challenge is perfect for me! I'll be really embarrassed if I screw this up. So, this post is inspired by Matthew Barney's Cremaster Cycle, a series of five films, released out of order, in which the Guggenheim was a major character. The series culminated in a major exhibition at the museum. As a tribute, this post will be written in five parts and displayed out of chronological order.

Part Three: The Entered Apprentice:

The Entered Apprentice

We open with the Entered Apprentice climbing up the atrium of the Guggenheim Museum. He is trying to get away from a woman with glass legs who has just transformed into a leopard. 

Much like Layana, she thinks she's the cat's meow.

Meanwhile, at the top of the ramp, the sculptor Richard Serra, representing the mythic architect of Solomon's Temple, is throwing molten Vaseline at a wall. 

It's art, people!

All of this represents the equilibrium in the stage of fetal development before the gonadal structures rise or fall to become ovaries or testes.

Tim: “Well, obviously. But I’m going to stop you there. I think you’ve pushed the boundaries just a bit too far. You need to rein it in a little.”

Patricia: "Are you scared by this post, Tim? Good. You should be scared. At least it means you’re feeling something."

Thank you, Patricia. I appreciate your support.

Patricia: “These people just don’t understand modern art like we do.”

So, where were we? Oh, yes:

Part One: The Ascending Team:

Michelle is working with Stanley on a giant dress made of bubble wrap. The model will pull two blimps, each containing the same woman who is creating images out of grapes.

avant garde look by Stanley and Michelle

Michelle: “I can just hear Nina now: ‘Meeechelle, no woman is going to want to pull a couple of Goodyear blimps around a football stadium. What were you theeenking?’”

But, it turns out the judges actually love their looks and they are the winning team. Stanley wins the challenge and $10,000.

Stanley does his happy dance

Part Five: The Descending Teams:

The designers are creating an avant garde piece and a companion ready-to-wear piece. They are in teams of two, one male and one female. Equilibrium had been achieved with Michelle and Stanley, but the tension between male and female is being felt in the other two teams. 

This tension is played out in two locations. Patricia and Richard are participating in a demolition derby in the lobby of the Chrysler Building, which represents ... um ... something about the Order of Freemasons? Whatever. 

These Chryslers are in the lobby of the Chrysler building.  How cool is that?

Patricia creates a pretty cool avant garde look with a veil. Richard spent two days making a bracelet. He’s out. Sorry, Richard.

Ursula Andress loves Patricia's look

Meanwhile, Daniel and Layana are at a rodeo, which represents the execution of a murderer who might have been the grandson of Harry Houdini. I have to admit that I got a little confused at this point. The result is that Daniel created his best look of the season. The jacket was beautiful and the skirt was modern and sexy. Layana inspired him to create a more youthful look and she forced him to make a miniskirt by hoarding all the fabric for herself, but it was still clearly his look and he had every right to take credit for it. Layana, on the other hand, created the worst look on the runway. It just had too much crap stuck onto it for no reason:

Is the sculpted Vaseline goat just one too many elements in this look?

Part Two: The HPmaster challenge:

The designers get to create their own textile designs using the new HPmaster system:

Tim: "Just look at this amazing technology! You can use the new HPmaster system to sit on the floor of a blimp and arrange grapes into any design you can think of! It's completely state of the art!"

The HPmaster grape design system

Michelle: "I am so inspired to design with grapes!"

Patricia: "It would take me at least four days to create a fabric design out of grapes on the floor of a blimp back in my studio. I love the new HPmaster system!"

OK, we get it. The designers love product placement. Can we get on with Tim making his rounds in the design room?

Tim: “Stanley and Michelle, I love everything about your looks! Your fabric is so amazing I have chills!”

Stanley: “Well, I think Tim really nailed that critique.”

Tim: “Patricia and Richard, on the other hand, are a mess. Richard hasn't done anything and I'm wondering if he's making sure Patricia is responsible for everything so she will have to take the blame."

Patricia: "What? I never considered that! Now I'm really angry that I didn't think of doing it first!"

Richard: "What? I'm flattered that anyone thinks I'm clever enough to actually have a strategy."

Part Four: Layana loses her ... uh ... stuff:

Daniel: “Why are you crying, Layana?”

Layana: “Daniel, several times during this challenge I tried to give you a high five and every time you either left me hanging or you missed my hand. I feel so betrayed by you.”

Daniel: “I’m sorry. My hands were a little awkward.”

Layana: “Not YOUR hands, Daniel. OUR hands! Our hands are fifty fifty.”

Daniel: “So now ALL the hands belong to you?”

Layana: “Just don’t speak to me any more."

And that brings us to the beginning of the HPmaster Cycle, where we are back in a state of equilibrium between the ascending and descending designers.

Nina: "I can see what you were trying to do with this post, but, unfortunately, it was not successful."

Rachel Roy: "I think if you took this post to Mattel and said, Hey I wrote this post for Barbie, they would tell you that it isn't even good enough for Barbie to read."

Heidi: "Yeah, I just don't get it."