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Project Runway<\/a><\/p>\n Viva La Fashion!<\/p>\n \n Season 22<\/p>\n Episode 5\n <\/p>\n \n Editor\u2019s Rating<\/p>\n 3 stars<\/p>\n ***\n <\/p>\n \n Project Runway\u2019s unconventional-materials challenge is wacky, but not as wild as the judges\u2019 infighting. We are halfway through this season of Project Runway, and we have reached a challenge I am really excited for: the unconventional-materials challenge. Now, is using paper towels a little lackluster compared with last year\u2019s Abbott Elementary crossover challenge<\/a>, where the contestants had to use school supplies? Sure. But I liked this challenge for pushing the contestants in two ways: creatively, in terms of how they dyed or manipulated the white paper towels, and technically, in terms of how they treated them like fabric for their looks. A two-tier challenge, with two days to work? What luxury! What opulence! If only all episodes were like this!<\/p>\n Oh, and Law and Tyra get in a major fight during judging. And of course, the producers had to mix up some drama by having each designer call out another as the weakest competitor. But still \u2014 a solid episode of Project Runway in its current incarnation. At least we didn\u2019t get models rubbing bronzer all over clothes, you know? Small victories.<\/p>\n Good-bye to Aaron, who unfortunately was clearly going to go home when Law called his look \u201cdisgusting,\u201d and who struggled to bring his heady, academic approach to fashion into the clothes he was actually putting on the runway. Again, Project Runway isn\u2019t about being the best designer; it\u2019s about being the best person who can sew a look in a day and sell it to the judges. Guest judge Willy Chavarria says as much: This show is now as much about gassing yourself up and using strategy to announce yourself as it is about the actual clothes, and I understand some people don\u2019t like that, but that\u2019s what the show has now been for a number of years. The pivot hasn\u2019t come out of nowhere. So, sorry to Aaron, and hello to Viva Paper Towels, who is putting up $20,000 for the winner of this challenge. Finally, some money on the table!<\/p>\n The challenge is pretty simple: Use the paper towels for at least one garment that can be worn for a \u201cnight on the town.\u201d (The designers can also buy fabric at Mood, with a limited budget.) The designers get one hour to experiment with dyeing the paper towels, which are presented to them in yard-wide uncut rolls. Naheim immediately homes in on making the paper towels look like denim with various shades of blue dye. Anna, whose specialty is unconventional materials, thinks she can weave the paper towels into making a knit top. (Christian is skeptical, as am I.) Bi thinks his tailoring skills will be useful here; if he can make a top and pants fit his model well, it will camouflage the paper-towel material. But Elizabeth and Bobby are most confident. They both gas up their textile design: Elizabeth is spray-painting over lace to create patterns on her paper towels, and Bobby is dip-dyeing the paper towels to create a Missoni-style pattern. IMO, though, I think Jeffrey has the best idea \u2014 he\u2019s using black dye to create an ombr\u00e9 effect on scallop-edged strips of fabric, which he\u2019s then sewing into ruffly rows on his top and pants. I love it.<\/p>\n Who\u2019s struggling in the workroom by the end of the first day? Joseph has now made it further than he made it last season, but he\u2019s frazzled by Law calling him arrogant. His cropped, boxy jacket design looks stiff and unwieldy, and he shares his past of getting an electrical-engineering degree to please his family while feeling uncomfortable in his own skin. He\u2019s worked hard to feel confident, and he wants to show it. Christian does help Joseph by trashing his frumpy halter top and encouraging him to give a jacket another try, and look, I don\u2019t like Joseph that much, but understanding more of his history is helpful. Other designers are pivoting, too. Anna realizes she can\u2019t knit her top, so she\u2019s redoing her dress design. Bryan was ruching green-dyed pieces of paper towels and attaching them to the top of his dress, but everyone \u2014 including a laughing Bi \u2014 says they look like lettuce, so Bryan makes the pieces bigger and more overlapping. Meanwhile, Bobby\u2019s dress has a really lackluster circle shape, but she refuses to take Christian\u2019s advice to change it.<\/p>\n In the minutes before the runway show goes down in an abandoned warehouse space (why were they there?), Elizabeth and Bryan both have construction issues. Bryan realizes there\u2019s a huge hole at the bottom of his dress, like maybe his model inadvertently stepped on it; he cuts the hole out, but now that portion of the hem looks like toilet paper stuck to the bottom of a shoe. Elizabeth\u2019s situation is worse: The fastener on the back of her dress just totally rips apart. The textile is cool \u2014 a grungy red-and-black print from the lacework \u2014 but the garment looks pretty patchily made, and now it\u2019s hanging open in the back.<\/p>\n Runway time! The judges are Heidi, Law, Tyra, and Willy, and Christian is on hand to explain which pieces are made out of paper towels. Immediate hits include Bi\u2019s fitted black tank top and wide-leg pants, Jeffrey\u2019s underboob-flashing two-piece, and Naheim\u2019s denim-looking jacket and pants. Less successful are Bobby\u2019s dyed dress with a frumpy scarf-style neckline, Anna\u2019s black minidress with a white pleated-paper-towel panel, and Elizabeth\u2019s falling-apart dress. (In general, it seems like the paper towels lent themselves better to separates than to dresses.) Heidi and Tyra are very complimentary about the designers\u2019 work overall, but as is Law\u2019s custom, he\u2019s more curmudgeonly, calling his fellow judges \u201cway too nice.\u201d And we get more of Law\u2019s acid tongue when the designers get back to their regular runway for judgment, and when Heidi asks them to \u201cspill the tea\u201d on each other.<\/p>\n Each contestant has to share which designer they are \u201cleast impressed with.\u201d It\u2019s really a way for Law to pick them apart. Elizabeth, Bobby, Bryan, Naheim, and Jeffrey all say Joseph, citing his repetitive silhouettes. Jude is the first person to break from that trend and say Bryan, whose work hasn\u2019t \u201cclicked for me.\u201d A couple of people, like Bi and Anna, try to say themselves, but when urged to name other people, Bi also goes with Joseph, while Anna says Bobby. That makes six of nine people identifying Joseph as the weakest link, and when Heidi gives Joseph the opportunity to respond, he starts talking about \u201cmy life is the life that I built,\u201d referencing how he now lives for himself and not others\u2019 expectations. It\u2019s a totally valid defense \u2014 and that Law interrupts to tear into him. \u201cIt\u2019s becoming the Joseph McRae show again, and I\u2019m not here for it,\u201d Law says. \u201cThere has to be something wrong with you if you\u2019re the common denominator.\u201d<\/p>\n I have a couple of questions here. Why does Law hate Joseph like this? Did he nastily tweet about Zendaya?\u00a0 Did Joseph do something personally to Law or his family? Joseph is annoying, sure. But there\u2019s such a level of personal animosity here, and I don\u2019t understand it. And it\u2019s also odd that Law doesn\u2019t acknowledge the possibilities that the other designers are picking on Joseph because they don\u2019t like that he\u2019s rolled over from season 21, or they\u2019re threatened by him winning a couple challenges already. Law just takes the other designers at face value. Do the producers give Law carte blanche to be a major asshole for one episode a season, and this is it? Even as tough love, it\u2019s too much.<\/p>\n The judges eventually discuss the clothes \u2014 but there, too, things get dramatic, with a lot of disagreement between Law and the other judges. Law says he would put Bi\u2019s outfit on Zendaya for the Dune: Part Three press tour, and that \u201ceveryone else who voted against you is stupid.\u201d When Heidi and Willy praise Bryan\u2019s gown of various pleated panels dyed different shades of green, Law interrupts to call the pleats \u201ctortured,\u201d and says the debate over the look \u201cis really bothering me.\u201d He seems to hate Bryan\u2019s dress, and he seems personally offended when Willy says Bi\u2019s look doesn\u2019t have \u201cany storytelling.\u201d Law gets Willy to admit that he\u2019d hire Bi to work in his atelier before hiring Bryan, and that sets off Tyra, and then Tyra and Law are each accusing the other of \u201coverstepping.\u201d<\/p>\n Maybe this was all staged for midseason drama. Who can say? But there is something Law said that I really liked, and that gets to the heart of Project Runway: Heidi, Law, and Willy all seem to be attracted to Bryan\u2019s look because it\u2019s so fantastical. As Law points out, though, just because a look is over the top doesn\u2019t mean that it\u2019s automatically fashion. Now, do I think this is a little hypocritical, given how often Law puts Zendaya in costumey looks himself? Yes. But I appreciate that he\u2019s willing to go to bat here for Bi\u2019s simple top and pants, and to argue for its worthiness as a look. I think Project Runway tends to award designs that feel big, opulent, and ostentatious, when sometimes something more simple and straightforward can be as, if not more, chic. I don\u2019t love Law\u2019s tactics all of the time, but I appreciated this take.<\/p>\n Who\u2019s on top and who goes home? Of course we don\u2019t know that yet! Viva next week, when we\u2019ll find out.<\/p>\n \u2022 Law better take Aaron out for a drink, and he better pay.<\/p>\n \u2022 I would like Christian\u2019s alligator-green leather jacket as long as it\u2019s not real alligator. Please, a dupe, come to me.<\/p>\n \u2022 Jeffrey\u2019s family is beautiful!<\/p>\n \u2022 We need to create some kind of system where every time Bryan again mentions Bi being his intern, a Who Framed Roger Rabbit?\u2013style mallet<\/a> hits him over the head. We get it, dude.<\/p>\n \u2022 A mallet for Law for telling Anna to \u201cjust walk off the stage\u201d if she doesn\u2019t believe in herself, too. Way harsh, Tai<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u2022 I don\u2019t know who Paige DeSorbo and Hannah Berner are; I don\u2019t understand why they toured the workroom and otherwise had nothing to do in this episode; and I refuse to learn.<\/p>\n \u2022 When Elizabeth said she wants to be in the top so she gets more feedback from the judges \u2026 maybe my theorizing last week<\/a> that the judging sessions are longer but get edited down for TV was wrong. Are these designers really spending weeks on this show with no constructive criticism at all?<\/p>\n Sign Up for the Vulture Newsletter<\/p>\n Entertainment news, for the pop-culture obsessed.<\/p>\n Vox Media, LLC Terms and Privacy Notice<\/p>\n
\n Photo: Spencer Pazer\/Disney\n <\/p>\n