If there’s a Project Runway Twitter (there has to be, right?), it was undoubtedly shook by last year’s news that Tim Gunn and Heidi Klum were exiting the long-running reality series to develop their own show for Amazon. In the months since that announcement, Bravo debuted another season of Project Runway, with model Karlie Kloss as the new Heidi and fashion designer (and previous series winner) Christian Siriano as the new Tim. The new season wasn’t bad, but it was definitely a downgrade for longtime fans and it was missing a bit of the magic that only my beloved and wildly supportive fictional uncle Tim Gunn could provide (seriously, where the hell is Swatch, the dog that lives at Mood?!). Thankfully, Amazon has finally revealed what Tim Gunn and Heidi Klum are up to with their new fashion competition series, which now has an official title—Making The Cut—and a 2020 premiere date.
The series sounds a little different from Project Runway, in that it features “12 talented entrepreneurs and designers from around the globe who are competing to take their fledging brands to the next level in becoming the next big global phenomenon.” While established designers have often competed on Project Runway, it seems like Making The Cut might be drawing from a wider pool of talent with that mention of “entrepreneurs.” But according to Amazon’s press release, things might not be that different from Project Runway, as Heidi and Tim filmed their first runway challenge yesterday in front of the Eiffel Tower in Paris—as evidenced by the promotional photos. Another thing that sets Making The Cut apart from Project Runway is that looks from the series will be available to purchase on Amazon. The press release doesn’t specify which looks, so it’s unclear if viewers will be able to buy each week’s winning looks or clothing from the series winner’s final collection.
Along with the first details, Amazon revealed some of the judges and guest judges who will appear on the first season of Making The Cut, including supermodel Naomi Campbell, actress and designer Nicole Richie, former Vogue Paris editor-in-chief Carine Roitfeld, and award-winning designer Joseph Altuzarra.
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I think it’s time to remind everyone that the show “Project Runway” was so named so it would sound of a piece with “Project Greenlight”, which aired a single season (and arguably, it’s most “successful”) on Bravo in 2005. Fifteen years later, “Runway” has been a sterling success while its quasi-namesake has been all but forgotten, even with a brief revival, or remembered only as a punchline and cautionary tale.
My favorite part of Project Greenlight was seeing Matt Damon tell minority film makers they didn’t have the “likeability” to get their work produced. What a goddamn American treasure he is…
I remember him saying some, ahem, “questionable” shit, but, whoa, I missed that!
Couldn’t find the clip I was thinking about…But… this is priceless.In the first few seconds of this clip we have Matt Damon explaining diversity hiring strategy, representation, etc. to a minority film maker. (A person who probably didn’t go to an Ivy League school, and thus doesn’t understand the way the world should work.)
This article neglects to mention how terrible the show became in recent years, where the focus shifted from fashion to interpersonal drama and “challenges” that had nothing to do with making clothes. This season’s return to form (lol) has been remarkably refreshing and contains a lot more of the magic than the previous 3-4 seasons.
And I bet, don’t even get you started about Project Runway All Stars!
Yes, I think even in shows like Rupaul, viewers have taken a shift in wanting to watch the art of the performances, the humour, etc. and are less interested in the drama between contestants.
Hester and the dull minimalist one were throwbacks to some of the more contrived personalities and drama-driven designers. But unlike previous seasons, the group of designers seemed more diverse. Like previous seasons, Nina and the other judges really didn’t seem to have any idea what to make of that diversity.Way too many of them were over their heads though. Way too many challenges felt like they were won by default (the video game and camping challenges come to mind). I hated that Hester made it to the final except that there really wasn’t anyone who really felt like they really deserved it more.
But their token tacky and fetish designers were pretty decent unlike recent Lifetime seasons. And they didn’t have the twins.
Christian Siriano hit it out of the park as the new mentor. I love LOVE Tim Gunn. But Siriano was breath of fresh air after watching Gunn devolve slowly into a bitchy version of his formerly sunny self.
Agreed, I miss Tim Gunn, but the show didn’t suffer without him (or Heidi).
The last few seasons Gunn seemed to feel kind of dispirited and sometimes hugely disconnected from the judges. I think Christian was actually an interesting replacement.
“It’s available for purchase on Amazon”? How about fuck that.We used to gripe about paying $100+ a month for 500 channels on cable, and now they want us to pay $15 a month for 20 different streaming channels, or purchase individual shows.So far, I haven’t seen anything on any of these subscription services that was substantially superior to what’s on cable, the only difference is that its costs more.So, sorry, Tim, love you, but I’ll be watching the “free” shit on Lifetime or Bravo or whatever the fuck.
So what you’re saying is…auf wiedersehen?
“looks from the series will be available to purchase on Amazon” Clothes will be available for purchase, not the show.
Ah, I’m an idiot. Though you still have to subscribe to Amazon Prime to watch the show, and fuck that.
Prime video is not the reason one subscribes to Amazon Prime. Free fast shipping is.
The clothes the contestants make will be available on Amazon.
Swatch still had a couple of good cameos in the latest season of Project Runway, even getting a shout out when a bunch of designers had to step over him to get in the standard “Mood shot” before Christian tells them to run and buy fabric.
The new season definitely lacked in terms of hosting with Karlie Kloss not being anywhere near as charismatic or interesting as Heidi, but Christian was pretty fun as a mentor. He wasn’t like Tim Gunn, no one will ever be, but he did carve out his own path and style that I think worked really well with the show. The new judges were pretty great as well, but I mean, its not hard to be more interesting than Zac Posen…..
The new Judges still had Nina, and Christian actually gave good, useful advice repeatedly (unlike Tim, who was often so disconnected from the judges), those who watched the new season are just happy the show is back on Bravo and focusing on the clothes again. No idea if the new Tim/Heidi joint will live up to the hype.
Could they have found any model with name recognition less interesting or compelling than Karlie Kloss?
For me, the best thing was they got back to it being about clothes. The weakness is and will be that the show has fallen off in terms of producing viable designers for the mainstream. There’s Siriano and a bunch of people who basically do special orders and limited collections that only fans of the show may even remember to search online for. The last batch of designers? Not ready for prime time. The best of them, Sebastian, is the weakest business and marketing man. Garreau is a fetish designer, full stop. Heather was a niche designer, who, if she were smart, would try to get a deal in Japan, where that aesthetic is meaningful. And that’s it. The rest were just dressmakers.
I suspect Sebastian will quietly do very well for himself, without becoming a household name.
Can we also add that the hour and a half run time is totally unnecessary? Shit drags. 60 minutes will suffice. Thank you.
I honestly liked Karlie, found her genuine and breezy. But maybe Adriana Lima would be someone with a little more gusto similar to Klum.
Karlie is no Heidi. That said, she’s miles better than any other non-Heidi ProRo franchise host (looking at you, Alyssa).
Ugh, Karlie Kloss is such a drip. A total charisma black hole. Christian’s pretty great, though.
I guess you could call me part of “Project Runway twitter” since I’m an occasional guest on “The Workroom” a podcast devoted to the show. This announcement lines up with what we’ve been expecting which is that the goal of the show will be to shift clothes for Amazon, probably with some nebulous retail agreement as part of the prize. I actually thought the latest Bravo season was somewhat of a return to form, definitely better than the last few Lifetime seasons of PR and PR All-Stars. (Also Swatch did show up for a few appearances in this last season, but either he has renegotiated for a higher ep rate or is just getting on in years, because you’ll miss him if you blink.)
I thought Karla found her stride about half way through. Siriano had me at, “swatching, we have time for swatching”. They are not Tim and Heidi, but that match may be hard to beat. But, we could give them a couple years to try!
At this point, I don’t care who brings back the far superior Project Runway Junior, I just want someone to do it soon, and regularly.
“The new season wasn’t bad, but it was definitely a downgrade for longtime fans…”Nope. Project Lifetime had seriously gone down in quality more and more as years went by. PR back in Bravo is finally interesting again.