Feeling a Little Queasy: The Project Runway recap

In the end, it took an act of God—or nature, if you prefer—to make the penultimate episode of this season even remotely interesting. Yes, I’m referring to Carol Hannah’s unfortunate stomach virus. Without the imminent threat of her dropping out of the competition—or hurling all over her gowns—last night’s episode would have been a total bore.

The hometown visits were pretty routine stuff, although I never tire of seeing Tim Gunn out of water (and clearly neither do the producers):

Tim Gunn dons an apron and bakes biscuits!
Tim Gunn operates a service elevator!
Tim Gunn drinks vodka with Irina’s Ruskie dad!
Tim Gunn tells Carol Hannah he. . . loves her?!? (Commence record scratching sound.)

I mean, I know Tim and Carol Hannah have something special going on but this may be the first time Tim ever told a contestant he actually loved them. (Well, except maybe for Andre).

As for these first glimpses at the collections? To be frank, none of them wowed me. Carol Hannah’s collection was randomly inspired by Duke University, which for me = automatic fail. (Go Terps!)

Irina went for the color of her soul—black—but had a potentially clever idea of using Coney Island post card iconography, until Tim Gunn informed her that it was a copyright infringement. Moral of this story? Karma is a bitch (and so are you).


Except for that navy blue sweater jacket that I coveted, Althea’s garments looked overworked and, yes, matronly. (But how bout that cutie-patootie boyfriend of hers?)


You could cut the tension with a sewing needle when Irina and Althea both arrived at the hotel in New York.
There were lots of tense smiles, and some fake “oh, I’ll just look around the suite” business, until they both just sat there stiffly, side by side, waiting for Carol Hannah. Who was a no show.

So then they are informed that Carol Hannah has the nasty contagious stomach plague—and both Althea and Irina’s minds go to the exact same place: Not, poor dear, I hope she’s okay. Not, oh my God, I can’t imagine how horrible this is for her.
But. . .if Carol Hannah drops out of the competition, that TOTALLY increases my chance of winning! Bonus!

So when little Carol Hannah does manage to drag herself to the studio the next day, they were visibly disappointed. At least, Althea offered a half-hearted, “Can I hug you?” Irina promptly said, “Don’t give me cooties.” She’s so warm.

Big shocking unexpected surprise! The designers have to make a 13th garment with the help of one of their fallen compadres: Logan, Gordana, and Christopher.

Althea gets to choose her Santa’s helper first and picks Logan. And a little part of Carol Hannah dies inside.

Irina picks Gordana, which is obviously the best move, because Gordana is, like, captain of the Serbian Olympic Sewing team.

And Carol Hannah takes Christopher. Cue the theme music to Will and Grace.

The gang walks to Mood. “We’re using our feet. This is New York!” says Tim Gunn. And do I detect the slightest bit of contempt for LA in his voice? Yes, yes I do. And the bulldog at Mood is named Swatch. Which is awesome.

Later, there is a visit from Michael Kors and Nina Garcia, as if this is going to make up for the fact that they missed half the season. Nina says something about an all black collection being a bad idea and Irina scowls at her (more than her usual scowl) and Nina scowls back (more than her usual scowl) and it is, to paraphrase Daniel Vosovic, “a mother fuckin’ scowl-off.”

Next week: Carol Hannah still puking her guts out! Irina still accusing Althea of copying her! Althea cries! Someone wins!
Is it season 7 yet?