I usually try to give "Project Runway" the benefit of the doubt on the shenanigans. But the episode ends with to be continued. They have done this before. Decided it was too hard to tell in a team of two where the failure lay, and so sent both designers back to the workroom for a short head to head face off, and then sent one home. I'm going to confess I had secretly hoped that they would send both Shawn and Claire home, but the judges seem to be working on the theory that one of them might be talented enough to stay., Normally I would be on board with that, but at this point I don't think "Project Runway" is in charge of breaking their co-dependency.
So, yeah, no closure here.
The challenge is a bunch of misdirects that boil down to the designers are assigned fabric in groups of two to create an outfit for JC Penney inspired by menswear but for women. They are working in teams, but not fabric teams, so must select another designer to work with. So, Kentaro and Brandon, Ayana and Michael, Margarita and Batani, Kenya and Amy, and Shawn and Claire. I know that last one shocked you. Ayana and Michael end up safe, so we spend very little time with them and will have to assume they enjoyed working together. Kentaro and Brandon are in their brotherhood zone and Michael slyly mentions that they seemed to ignore everything Tim said to them so he hopes they get so confident they end up falling flat.
Margarita and Batani and Amy and Kenya both have troubled partnerships. As do Shawn and Claire. Amy says she went into this thinking well, Kenya's been more successful than I so, I can learn from her, and then gets really nervous when Kenya is spending time on something they are trying as a back up idea rather than focusing on the primary garments and starts to realize partway through that she should have taken more ownership and then is trying to change the dynamics on the fly and so they start runway day a little snippy with each other. It's really hard to shift on the fly and Amy and Kenya both realize that they are not working well together but are trying to figure out in limited time how to address this.
Margarita and Batani have distinct styles and Batani is asking a lot of questions and I suspect - through my expert ability to assume things based on highly edited footage - that it's partly a question difference. If you are a person who doesn't ask a lot of does this go here, how would I do this questions, you can sometimes interpret working with people who externally process a lot as them needing a lot of help. Sometimes they do. And sometimes they were just asking as they thought it through in their head and if you just let them go, they figure it out. But Margarita was trying to be the best teammate and kept jumping in, and we see very little interview with Batani so she didn't seem bothered by it, but also maybe didn't need it.
Shawn and Claire are reaching that hour ten in the backseat of the car level of sniping. Claire appears to possibly be trying to pull back a bit, and not jump in to help her sister on every little thing. She says at the beginning of the episode that she's been in the bottom twice now and really needs to evaluate. And in sisterly fashion Shawn says, I have too. Totally ignoring that she was in the top in the last episode with a pair of pants her sister made for her. (I do get that the sibling thing makes it very very hard to let your sibling claim a thing that you have also experienced, and first! But whew.)
Top is Kentaro and Brandon with hoodie mix and match separates that are pretty much the exact blend of what you would have expected of them. Margarita and Batani are also there with a shirt dress and a fancier dress with sailoresque buttons. Margarita wins with her asymmetric shirt dress.
Kenya and Amy are in the bottom with a demin pantsuit with an asymmetric scoop neckline that is an attempt to make it modern and just makes it look more strange. The other outfit has a top with a necktie and pants. Both are a little blah but well made. In Kenya's defense, while I wouldn't buy this outfit, it is right in line with the other things she has been making. Just in a less interesting fabric.
Shawn and Claire, you will be shocked to learn, created a sweatshirt inspired thing and a T-shirt inspired thing. Shawn had Liris, one of the larger models and was very nervous that she would get called out for making crappy things for a curvy girl again, so made a sweatshirt inspired dress, with a ribbon along the edge that, let's face it, looked a lot like the sweatshirt dress Claire was in the bottom for last week. Claire made a t-shirt that was two fabrics. And then made a thing that looked like two sleeves sewn together and wanted to do it as a boob tie until Tim stepped in. Then as a waist tie. Kentaro suggested hip tie which was better and helped disguised that the jeans they made were ill fitting in the rear area. (Their poor models say that knowing they are working with the twins, they were happy their outfits were done.)
So Heidi announces the head to head challenge and, then the dreaded to be continued.
