Take it runway (Part 12)...

Once more it's time for...

A Project Runway Rundown from a gay man's and a straight man's perspectives

Finale, Part 1

Wedding dresses! They need to do wedding dresses?? Ugh.
So the designers are sent home to design their lines. Korto to Little Rock, Leanne to Portland, Jerell to LA, and Kenley to Brooklyn.

Tim visits each one, as he always does. First is Korto.
Tim's thrilled to be in Arkansas? I'm pretty sure this is his first, and probably last, trip to Arkansas.
My initial feel is that I like her designs. Nice colors, nice shapes. A bit simple, but it might be just enough to get her to Fashion Week.
I like the wedding dress, at least what she's got done of it. Have to see the final thing though to be sure.
And she has a beautiful family story of going against the odds and getting to where she's at. Her family had it tough and they persevered. Inspiring.
Yes, Tim meets her family, her friends (STAR!) and gets a drum performance.

Next up is Leanne. D'oh! She has a boyfriend. I gotta get them broken up. Her beau seems to match her perfectly, though. Dammit.
Yeah, when they showed Nathan, my first two thoughts were, in this order: 1) damn, he's cute, and 2) poor Dave S.
She has a beautiful line going. She's going for a water/wave look and it works on all levels. Really nice work. And I'm not saying that because I think she should win. This is really nice work. And she still has weeks to work on it.
I like the wave motif as well. And with the designs we've seen from her before, she could really pull this off.
And then, she takes Tim on a bicycle ride for two!

Commercial break: Jack looks DAMN hot in his Saturn-inspired design. But then, of course, he would. In anything, really. back to the show.

Jerell is next on Tim's visits. Everything seems to be a bit messy. A bit too many fabrics tossed together. I bit too many accessaries, perhaps. Tim voices his concerns too, but Jerell seems to not want to pay attention. That worries me.
I thought his dress was tissue paper...crumpled tissue paper. I too noted how he ignored Tim's advice. Don't there designers watch the previous season of this show??? You ALWAYS listen to Tim!!!
And as for Jerell's 'love interest', all I can say is Leannimal's boyfriend was much cuter. And so was the black guy in the wife-beater in Jerell's apartment too.

Kenley is Tim's last stop, a mere two and a half weeks prior to Fashion Week. Her wedding dress is absolutely gorgeous. And the hand-painted fabrics are beautiful. I'll be damned if she doesn't actually have a chance...
Ropes...as a choker? And the Wedding dress...I must have NO fashion sense, Dave S., cause all I'm seeing is Big Bird. Who wants feathers like that on a wedding dress???

So they make it back to NYC.
And they're staying in a Presidential Suite. SCHWEET! And on Times Square. I aspire to one day be rich enough to at least glimpse the place in real life. I'll never make enough to actually stay there. But moving on....

Was there even a shred of sincerity in Kenley's giggling, over-the-shoulder 'apology' for being a bitch? But by the same token, was there any sincerity in Korto's toast to good luck?

Tim breaks it to them that they have one more challenge: To create a bridesmaid's dress that goes with the wedding gown that they were told should already be a part of their Fashion Week collection. It's going to be what the judges use to determine who goes to the final three.
Ooooh, popping this on them at the last minute...nasty.

Leanne's bridemaid's dress is a knockout and it's not even finished yet. Jerell's is still a mess, as well as Korto's. Kenley's seems like it might be a bit boring.
I reserved comment on the bridesmaids gowns until seeing them on the runway.

Tim gives them a pep talk, but ends up crying about not wanting to see any of them be eliminated at this point. It makes me want to cry too for some bizarre reason...
Awwww, Dave S., you old softy. I was too taken aback that the stone facade that IS Tim Gunn actually cracked a bit and allowed this true emotion to come through. Nice.

And this is my meager moment of hotness: Seeing Leanne with wet hair, just out of the shower. ::shudder:: Pathetic ecstasy, I know, but, hey, Polt's had all sorts of moments with Jerell...
Hehehehe....yeah, and not ONE single Jerell junk crotchshot this week either.

So it's on to the runway...
But, wait, I gotta say that Leanne's glasses are *so* majorly sexy...
*SIGH*....Dave S., I like Leannimal, and I think she's kinda...cute. But seriously, everytime I see her, I see dowdy librarian lady. Oh well, different strokes, ya know? :)

Jerell:
The wedding dress still seems a bit messy. Did he not listen to Tim?
The bridemaid's dress isn't much better. I'm worried for Jerell.
Sloppy and Messy look to them, although that's probably the fabric. What the HELL are those flowers sticking outta her head. honestly, I liked the bridesmaid better than the bride.

Kenley:
Her wedding dress is still beautiful. The layers of feathery stuff looks great.
Her bridesmaid's dress looks kind of plain, though I like how the skirt matches the feel of the accompanying wedding dress.
Dude, I am SO not getting it. I see a big bird feathered wedding dress in white and off white, and then I see a too short poofy blue bridesmaids gown. I see no coherence between the two, I see no connection at ALL. If these are to be worn at a wedding, God forbid, then they're from two different weddings.

Korto:
Ugh. The wedding dress looks too overworked and the colors are kinda ugly.
The bridesmaid dress looks nice, but only matches the wedding dress in that the color scheme is similar. I'm worried for Korto as well.
Messy bride dress again. And WAY overworked. The color scheme is the same on both, but that's about it for coherent.

Leanne:
Gorgeous work on the wedding dress. The flow of layers is great and it has a nice overall feel.
And her bridesmaid's dress is a near-perfect match. Slightly different in color, but pulls in the right elements to make it match the wedding dress. Great work.
I gotta be honest, I do not like the wedding gown much. It's not at all a bad dress, and it's expertly made. And the wave motif looks great too. but I don't like the....poofiness of the middle, where the waves are. It seems out of place with the rest of the dress. the bridesmaid, however, is outSTANDing. Carries the motif through, is a beatiful shade of blue. Just gorgeous.

The judges praise both Leanne and Kenley -- and rightfully so-- but have a problem with both Korto and Jerell. Jerell they say is pulling in too many elements and it seems (surprise!) messy. Korto's dresses are too overworked and are a bit too complicated. Plus, her palette is a bit dull for a wedding party and they don't match up well enough to each other.
Right away they declare Leanne and Kenley as in. And Jerell and Korto as the bottom two. This is a fair judgement in my opinion. Both didn't put out their best work here.
Ultimately, they push out Jerell, placing Leanne, Kenley and Korto in the top three.
Though it was a toss-up, I think they sent the right person home.
As much as I would've liked to see Kenley pushed out, she did have a nice design, while both Jerell and Korto fell a little flat. Personally, I think they made the right decision.

I thought Leannimal had the best pair of designs by a mile.
I thought Kenley's was the worst because the stark differences between the gowns. I could see both Jerell's and Korto's dresses together in the same wedding. Not at all for Kenley's. And honestly, as short as her dress was...that's a going out to party, get drunk and get fucked dress. It's not for a semi-formal/formal situation like a wedding.
For that reason, I thought Kenley should be booted. But I knew before they even said anything they weren't going to boot Kenley. I don't know why, but they seem bound and determined to keep moving her on, when in at least three challenges she should have gone home.

So since they're keeping her, I gotta say I'd send Jerell home. His was just plain messy, and even if it wasn't, those flowers-sprouting-from-the-head thing is reason enough for him to go. Not a good design at all. I don't think he was the right one to go, but when you remove Kenley from consideration, as the judges, or producers, have decided to do, then he was the one that had to go.

At this point, I can see Leanne winning it all. She had a cohesive line that completely communicated what she was aiming for. And it's a line that is beautiful.
I agree. I didn't see anything from the other two to match what she was doing. But remember, the producers like Kenley, so who knows what'll happen next week.




Next Week: Holly Hobby dresses, fashion week, missing models and scissors

POLT Listening to "Everybody's Changing" by Keane

The war, energy prices, the failure with Katrina...Republicans can't govern. - Democratic Representative Rahm Emmanuel, 2005