Yet what I was struck most with about Project Runway season 20 is just how much freakin’ fun it is to see everyone back and creating again.Ĭhristian Siriano, Project Runway 20 mentor, in this season’s second episode (Photo by Heidi Gutman/Bravo) Whatever it is called, Project Runway is, thankfully, holding on to what worked-a gorgeous workroom on the river, a panel of judges anchored by Nina Garcia but not centered on her-and letting go of what did not make sense (sorry, Karlie Kloss).
Lifetime’s Project Runway All Stars was a separate show, giving the designers an additional showcase for their work, but always felt to me like a bizarro version of the main show, like with Isaac Mizrahi pretending to be Michael Kors. In the grand tradition of networks ignoring history, Bravo is calling this season calls itself Project Runway All Stars. But the introduction of the all-stars is giving it life. In many ways, the start of Project Runway season 20 doesn’t change its flavor a whole lot different from seasons 17, 18, or 19. But then it stumbled around for the past two seasons, somewhere between forgettable and repulsive. When it returned to Bravo four years ago, Project Runway leapt out of the gate, finding great new judges in Elaine Welteroth and Brandon Maxwell, and interesting designers. Heidi Klum and Tim Gunn are long gone, self-evicted to their gloomy Amazon Prime Video show. Project Runway, too, is looking to redeem itself, making its way back to what made it a cultural icon instead of a commodity that was yanked from Bravo, drained of life on Lifetime, and then sold off as an asset. They’re charged in the first challenge with reinventing that garment. That emotion is sometimes complicated: After the designers see (reproduced versions of) the outfit that got them eliminated from the competition, season 7’s Mila Hermanovski describes it as “trauma lane.” “You are all like my children,” Nina Garcia says after a montage of her verbally eviscerating their work. Project Runway season 1 contestant Nora Pagel at Mood during season 20’s first challenge (Photo by Zach Dilgard/Bravo)Īmid all of this, there’s a sense of reunion, of homecoming, of trying again, and it’s warm and fuzzy and just a delight to watch. I don’t disagree, and I also include Bishme in that category. “I’m here amongst greatness,” Bishme says, reflecting on watching Kara Saun as a teenager. The range of contestants-designers from more-recent seasons include Hester Sunshine and Prajje Oscar Jean Baptiste-means that some of them know each other as peers and friends, while others are celebrities. I was delighted to see so many of these people from the past back on screen-Kara Saun from season 1, Kayne from season 3, Rami from season 4.
Season-one’s Nora Pagel was, back in 2004, a 21-year-old mohawked designer whose experience consisted of interning at a fashion house, while today she’s creative director at the same place, spending her time not at a sewing machine but managing other designers.Īnna Zahou has moved away from her palette of black and white and is working with bright colors now, reflecting the glee that having a kid brought into her life. Others are so close to their eliminations that being asked to revisit and reimagine the outfits that ousted them is quite raw. Some designers have moved on in their careers so they’re disconnected from the kinds of things Project Runway demands of its designers, such as sewing. The start of Project Runway season 20, Bravo’s first all-star version of its flagship fashion design competition, opens as a meditation on the passage of time: on aging on evolving creatively on stepping back into an uncomfortable, challenging space.
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