Project Runway 11 Weekly Rundown Thread * No comments, please! *

This is a recap thread for each episode. Please use the individual episode discussion threads to comment on the shows.

Week 1: There is No “I” in Team
Season 11 returns with a twist that throws 16 eager new designers into a panic when they discover they will be participating in the series first-ever "Teams Edition."
Challenge: In the premiere episode, the designers will have New York as their inspiration in creating their garments.
Budget: $1,200 per team, to be divided between the designers however they like
Episode details
* One team names themselves “Keeping it Real”.
They get to view NYC from afar (by boat) to get inspiration.
Their team members are:

Amanda Valentine
Daniel Esquivel
Joseph Aaron Segal
Kate Pankoke
Layana Aguilar
Patricia Michaels
Richard Hallmarq
Stanley Hudson

* The other team names themselves “The Dream Team”.
They get to view NYC from above (from the roof of Atlas apartments).
Their members are:

Benjamin Mach
Cindy Marlatt
Emily Pollard
James Martinez
Matthew Arthur
Michelle Leshiak Franklin
Samantha Black
Tu Suthiwat Nakchat

* Patricia is Native American and her native name is Water Lily.
* Layana is from Brazil.
* Benjamin Mach is from Australia.
* Kate has a bridal business.
* Amanda is the sister of James Valentine, the lead guitarist of Maroon 5.
* Tu was a Buddhist monk in Thailand before leaving to pursue fashion and dance fabulously.
* Cindy owns a funeral home. She recently graduated from design school and was excited to get her business going.
* Instead of giving the designers individual critiques, Tim meets with each group at a time and moderates, participates and facilitates while they critique each other.
* Keeping It Real worked well together and supported their team. Even the Dream Team noticed how they worked together and worried: would their independent process come back to bite them in the butt?
* The Dream Team begins to struggle when they realize that Emily hasn’t planned her design well with the time constraints. No one wants to help her, not realizing that it will affect the entire team. At the last minute, Cindy offers to help Emily complete a really awful bolero jacket over a terrible halter top and skirt.
* Team Keeping It Real walked first, then team Dream Team. Each model walked individually and then all eight of the models walked together for each team.
Guest judges: Christian Siriano
Top 3: Daniel Esquivel, Patricia Michaels, Richard Hallmarq
Winner: Daniel Esquival
Bottom 3: Cindy Marlatt, Emily Pollard, James Martinez
Eliminated: Emily Pollard

Next week: Uniforms for a social club

Week 2: Spin Out
Challenge: The designers serve up ball-boy outfits and new server uniforms for a Ping-Pong social club called SPiN (Susan Sarandon is one of the owners).
Budget: $500 per team
Episode details
* The challenge involves making 5 uniforms per team—3 female server uniforms, 1 male server uniform, and 1 ball boy uniform. Therefore, each team gets 3 female models and 2 male models. The club’s logo and slogan must be worked into the uniforms.
* To get an idea of the features the staff needs for their uniforms, the designers work at Spin prior to starting on their outfits.
* Tu says his parents were in the restaurant business and he’s worked all the positions in a restaurant. His experience didn’t prevent him from breaking glassware left and right.
*Benjamin attempts to take the lead on his team, since he has experience in restaurants and designing uniforms, but he does about as well with team leadership as Tu did with handling glassware.
* Benjamin shadows Cindy in an effort to help her but she accuses him of micromanaging her so he backs off.
*Daniel tutors Layana, showing her some tricks he’s picked up on the fly (he didn’t go to design school), and they create a winning look, which Daniel lets her take credit for since he won immunity last week.
*We learn that Susan Sarandon has never heard of a skort, after she finds out that’s what the winning look is called.
*Richard wisely steers Joseph away from using polka dots in their ball boy uniform and they create one of the most innovative looks.
*Matthew planned to make jeans for his team’s ball boy but after Tim challenges him to create something more out of the box, Matthew takes Michelle’s suggestion and makes a denim kilt.
* The shirt James makes is so bad, his team urges him to start over and create another one. He does so grudgingly, making another shirt just as bad as the first one.
*Amanda creates a little black dress for the female servers, with the emphasis on “little”. The other designers on her team worry the judges will think it’s way too short.
*There are lots of “ball jokes” this episode, because of the challenge being at a ping-pong social club with the slogan “Balls are our business”.
Guest judges: Susan Sarandon
High Scores: Daniel Esquivel, Joseph Aaron Segal, Layana Aguilar, Richard Hallmarq, Stanley Hudson
Winner: Layana Aguilar
Low Scores: Benjamin Mach, Cindy Marlatt, James Martinez, Matthew Arthur
Eliminated: James Martinez

Next week: The designers make an outfit for Heidi