![]() ![]() The scenes where designers picked their models, the last of whom was sent home, were a big part of the show. It was hardly America’s Next Top Model, but the first season of Project Runway was just as much a competition for the models as it was the designers. Even the least fashion-conscious viewers knew: When Tim Gunn was worried about a designer, you should be, too. PR devotees might remember Santino’s classic impression of Gunn in semi-erotic fan fiction in season two. But his monotone drawl, complete lack of poker face, and endearing “Make it work!” accidental slogan made him a reality-TV-show star by the season’s end. Hardly anyone outside of Parsons knew who Tim Gunn was before Project Runway. He said what everyone was thinking but couldn’t say (“You think for the last challenge, Wendy, you could’ve put lipstick on”), and waving around phalluses constructed out of leftover scraps, Jay’s often-borderline-inappropriate antics and sassy ways made him a real charmer. When he wasn’t chain-smoking in a faux-fur stole, winner Jay McCarroll was busy becoming Project Runway’s fan favorite. And though her taste was sometimes questionable (she thinks future teenagers will dress like Pocahontas and basically made a Big Bird–inspired red-carpet look), she ended up in the final three.ħ. Contestants would catch her talking to herself outside the sewing room, and she would steal models for no reason other than proving she could. It became clear throughout the show that lil’ ol’ West Virginian mom Wendy Pepper had the sewing skills, but she failed to understand that Project Runway was more about design than ruthless competition. … Except Wendy, who eventually became the perfect reality-TV villain. Everyone was entertaining but not in a way that screamed, “Put my quotes on a T-shirt!”Ĩ. Kara Saun was already a successful TV-show stylist, but Nora Caliguri was a recent Pratt grad. Everybody was wildly different in tastes and experience, and their personalities were natural rather than cartoonish. There were decadent hyperromantics like Austin Scarlett and cynical, funky craftsmen like Jay McCarroll. Just as the judges were picked for their talent, so were the contestants, a choice that set the early days of Project Runway apart from other TV competitions. Contestants’ personalities didn’t feel forced … Although shows like Work of Art (props to Vulture’s Jerry Saltz), Top Design, and Blow Out never reached the same success as Project Runway, they created an image of Bravo as a network that lived and breathed luxury and pop culture, which still holds strong even now, when Project Runway lives on Lifetime.ĩ. But with the explosive success of Project Runway in the mid-2000s, the cable network completely revamped itself by creating other design-oriented TV shows in niche categories. It ushered Bravo into an era of design-heavy TV shows.īelieve it or not, the pre– Real Housewives Bravo featured a whole lot of Cirque du Soleil reruns. ![]() No one was combative each just had his or her fashion game down.ġ0. Garcia acted as the levelheaded critic, Kors the salesman/artist, and Klum the ideal customer. It’s not often in the world of reality TV that a show lucks out immediately with an excellent crop of judges, but supermodel Heidi Klum, then– Elle fashion director Nina Garcia, and designer Michael Kors were perfect for the show. Suburban teens, meet S&M-inspired swimwear! But Project Runway brought basic-cable-owning Americans into the world of dressmaking and runway shows, making “Olympus Fashion Week” a household name in the process. It demystified the fashion world for a wider public.īefore fashion bloggers were quickly making their way from Instagram accounts and Wordpress pages to the front row of Fashion Week, the world of high fashion was a gated one. Take a time machine back to the land of Austin Scarlett’s lip gloss and high-fashion postal-service outfits with these 12 reasons why Project Runway’s first season was the best.ġ2. Its first season is a perfect time capsule of mid-2000s reality TV, a niche-market competition show that struck a perfect balance between drama, compelling design, and hilarious contestants. You’re either in or you’re out, and from the moment Project Runway hit American television screens, it was clear the show was in. ![]()
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