I (Heart) Project Runway Philippines

I hurried home last night from my meeting because of a very important TV viewing appointment – the Finale of Project Runway Philippines! Haha! I swear I’m a big fan. I’m addicted to the original American series so I was kind of worried that the Filipino producers might massacre the franchise, especially when another one – Philippines’ Next Top Model – produced by the same company Solar Entertainment, turned out to be a total trash.

Thank God, Solar finally came to its senses and put together the right production team with no less than production stalwart Unitel. The show came out glossy and although it could still need some tad bit improvements here and there, over all Project Runway Philippines worked more than I expected. It was a winner!

Obviously, the Filipino production did their homework for the show. Like how any franchise should be, they didn’t attempt even for a second to CHANGE anything about the elements of the show. They didn’t try to “Filipinize” or “localize” it. The fact that the cast was All-Filipino already made it Pinoy.

This should be a golden lesson to all the big networks out there who are all guilty of butchering the beauty of our favorite Reality shows by shamelessly “modifying” the shows’ format to suit the taste of the masa or worse the networks’ own cheap standards of production value. The same principles in business franchising should apply to TV shows. The format comes in a full package. Guidelines should be strictly followed. That’s how you protect the brand’s value.

I never missed an episode of Project Runway Philippines. I even watch it with my husband :-) He even puts in his own “critique” on the designs whenever it was runway time. Naks, diba? Anyway, part of our wedding vows was to watch each other’s favorite shows, no matter how unbearable. I watch wrestling with him and I too have been learning a lot.

Anyway, like I said earlier though there’s still some room for improvement, I have more good things to say about the show. First of all choosing TERESA HERRERA as the Host was an exquisite choice! I have long been a fan of Teresa. I haven’t met her yet but I know her younger sister Rosario, who I have gotten close to back when she was our in-house VJ stylist for MTV several years ago.

I liked it that they chose someone who wasn’t that visible locally and someone who has had her taste of Hollywood. You can definitely tell that Teresa’s sharp. Even though I’m pretty sure a lot of her spiels were scripted, her delivery didn’t give it away and her own opinions truly displayed clout. She was definitely no stranger to fashion. If you don’t remember her, she’s had considerable exposure in Filipino commercials back in the 90s. She’s been on fashion spreads far too many times here and abroad. Teresa alone made the show glossy. And that’s a good start.

Although it was quite obvious that the show was trying to fill in existing character molds – Heidi Klum, Michael Kors, Nina Garcia and Tim Gunn – I’d like to say that their Pinoy versions didn’t just come out as doppelgangers. At least you could see that they didn’t try TOO HARD to be these characters. I’ve interviewed RAJO LAUREL many times already for MTV Fashionista, and I’ve even made a special show with him and KC Concepcion years ago, and based on the amount of filming exposure I had with him, I could say that he was a good choice for a judge because I knew that he could give those JUICY SOUNDBITES!

Let’s face it not all designers are cam-worthy. I produced MTV Fashionista for many years and I have interviewed designers from high places and the rookie ones, and I could really only count with my fingers those who can articulate themselves on camera.

JOJIE LLOREN, the designers’ mentor didn’t have the suaveness of Tim Gunn but his maternal-like counseling made him a league of his own. He didn’t try to be Tim, he was simply Jojie and it worked. I already got positive feedback about his teaching skills since way back so I guess even if he wasn’t as verbose as Tim he certainly had the proficiency and clout in his task at PRP.

I’ve had my share of being part of two local Reality TV shows and if there’s one thing that I learned about what makes GOOD reality TV – it’s the TALK FACTOR! In a way, Project Runway Phil was fortunate with its subject. Let’s admit it, fashion design as an industry is 80-90% gay! And I don’t think nobody would even dare to second guess that gay people are really very artistic, flamboyant and candid.

Reality TV capitalizes on outrageous human behavior so there you go. Back-stabbing, side-comments and hissing remarks were obviously easy to induce. That was what PNTM (Phil Next Top Model) lacked. Unfortunately the models they got for the show didn’t have the gift of gab. Or maybe if the models didn’t use English and just backstabbed each other in Tagalog or in their local dialect then that would have been more realistic and compelling!

The designers at Project Runway Philippines used English most of the time during their confessions but despite the “language struggle” by some of them, their honest quips were good enough. I was entertained. :-) I would always jump on my seat whenever Eli (the most controversial among them) would make his comments on Rajo and APPLES ABERIN-SADHWANI (the other judge). It was kind of refreshing to finally see the real essence of Reality TV on Philippine TV.

Well, the PBB housemates may have been very candid but they were just backstabbing fellow regular joes. We Filipinos are not very known to openly criticize people in high places and on camera for that matter and yet here’s this ELI GONZALES, a virtual unknown but who was blunt enough to say on national TV that Rajo’s cholesterol level must have clouded his judgment and Apples was nothing but a “model who got lucky.” Whew! Guilty pleasure at its best! I really got a kick out of that.

During the recap episode where the judges and all the eliminated and remaining designers gathered for a “bull session,” Eli of course took a subtle beating from Rajo and Apples. Rajo though gracious about the said comments was obviously irked. And of course Apples had nothing to say but “let’s move on” and added a subtle warning about tactfulness at the end. Surprisingly, Teresa had the spiciest remark about the whole thing when she added “That’s fashion! Suck it up!”

Well that’s true in a way. Fashion has always been the most fickle and clique-ish and ruthless industry. It’s the first cousin of the Entertainment industry, by the way. And they’re actually in an incestuous relationship. Hahaha!

Casting of the designers was not THAT perfect. It was kind of lopsided with a gay-girl ratio of 8-6 but of course that was expected. I would have to say that at least they were able to cast stereotypical characters that were good for TV – the pretty girl with novice talent; the villain; the manang killjoy; the friend-ng-bayan; the taklesa; the babaeng-bakla; the probinsiyano; the outstandingly boring… Those were the only characters that stood out. The rest were mediocre versions.



Nobody was that obnoxious as Santino from Project Runway Season 2 (US) and nobody emerged as a wicked witch like Wendy from Season 1 (US). I hope PRP’s 2nd season would produce such characters. And I really hope that they find a straight guy designer. That would be interesting. I know there are a handful of really straight young male designers out there because I have encountered some of them during my stint at Fashionista.

Now let’s talk about the Finale. From the get-go it was quite obvious that the three finalists ARIES LAGAT, PHILIPP TAMPUS and VEEJAY FLORESCA would make it to the final runway show. Although Veejay only won one challenge, while Aries and Philipp were head to head in the most number of wins, the former almost always had high scores. Honestly, among the three I didn’t want Veejay to win. I’m not being a bad person here okay? Let’s just talk TV and discuss their characterizations without any personal associations.



Fiction wise, Veejay was a typical villain. The fact that he would copy his opponent’s design; sneak in a garment that was against the rules; intentionally steal someone else’s model, etc… easily makes him a textbook baddie. He would be that person-you-love-to-hate. Any reality TV show needs one. And he served that purpose. Again, we’re just talking about his characterization on the show, okay? I don’t know the guy and I’m pretty sure he’s a good person in real life.

After the final showdown at SMX, Rajo put it perfectly – Philipp was the Romantic Designer, Veejay was the Modernist, while Aries was the Technician. These descriptions were spot on. I have always loved Philipp’s creations because they were very feminine. I guess growing up with several older sisters and a mother who had a flair for fashion was enough explanation. Plus there was just something in him that exuded humility and "goodness." Sort of like rooting for the underdog!

I was disappointed with Veejay’s final collection because I felt that it was reeking of a conscious attempt to sell himself as a prêt-a-porter designer. It was obvious that Veejay was running ahead of the competition and was already focused more on the “lucrative business” that he was about to have after the show. His collection was blah. I mean, they were good. They were very wearable but that’s a No-No in fashion runways unless the show really called for an RTW collection.

I’m no fashion expert, I’m not even a raging fashionista but I understand fashion – the business and the art of it all. Fashion designers are first and foremost ARTISTS. If painters have chi-chi art gallery openings, Hollywood actors have glitzy movie premieres, and Pop stars have sold-out concerts, then a designer’s fashion show is his version of THAT ONE IMPORTANT NIGHT! You have to put on a SHOW dah-ling!

Veejay didn’t put on a show and it was even a bigger shame that he had a monotone collection with problematic fabric choices. That is why hands down ARIES LAGAT became the first ever winner of Project Runway Philippines. Not only that he beat Philipp in having a more cohesive theme in his collection, he even had the wow factor and pulled the rug out of the judges’ wits!

He had that portion in his runway show when a seemingly out of place '50s dress came out on the catwalk. But just before the judges could mark that as a big mistake, two other models came out and deconstructed this questionable dress. As it turns out, the simple dress could be stripped away into two separate pieces that matched the outfits already worn by the two other models. Voila, you get three separate pieces all ready for mixing and matching and even morphing! Talk about fashion functionality! It was impressive.

At that point, based on the judges’ body language that was captured by the cameras, I already knew who the winner was going to be. If there’s one thing that just irritates me a tad bit about Aries is that he always has these grandiose stories, rationales or concepts behind his designs. His final collection even had this elaborate space woman crashing into earth story that just went on and went on as he explained before the judges. I mean, seriously it’s just fashion.

So there… I can’t wait for the 2nd season. I can’t believe that I would actually become a big fan of a local show. I don’t watch local TV anymore. Heck, I don’t even watch my own TV shows. Hahaha. (Well that’s because I already know what’s gonna happen) :p

To know more about Project Runway Philippines and find out what in the world am I talking about, I guess you can check out these sites:

Project Runway Philippines on Wikipedia
Project Runway Philippines Fansite
Project Runway Philippines links on Wordpress