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Time for "Nick's Looks"--my weekly blog on my Mentor fashion. For this past week's Episode 6--we visited the beautiful Getty Villa/J. Paul Getty Museum in Pacific Palisades, where the designers had a challenge to create looks inspired by the Getty Villa and new film "Pompeii". On the morning of this episode, of course we had no idea where we were going, we were only told the night before that the Challenge introduction would not be at FIDM but instead "off site". We drove and drove until we arrived at the Getty Villa. It was a very windy and slightly cold (for Southern California standards) morning--as you can see from our coats/jackets above.




Thurston Nick III: I wore a vintage navy blue double breasted jacket I found in a thrift store ages ago, a Zara blue striped dress shirt with white French cuffs and collar, jeans, a Robert Talbott orange printed silk scarf and my Marc Jacobs cuff links. It was my "Thurston Howell III of Gilligan's Island" look, or at least that's how I made fun of myself. I should have also brought a swimsuit to go into that pool--but I'm sure I might have gotten kicked off the premises, only to be "black-listed" from the Getty Villa!




Twinsies: When we arrived at the Getty Villa, and waited and waited to begin filming, I noticed that two of the "Project Runway: Under The Gunn" designers--Sam Donovan (left) and Shan Keith Oliver (right) were almost identically dressed: khaki pants and jean jacket. I had to capture a pic of them! We asked them if they had planned this, and according to them, they had not (yeah right!).



The Following Day/Runway Day:










For judging/runway day, I wore an ASOS wine colored suit, Topman skinny tie, a scarf I made out of silk fabric that I had (from my dress line)...




Zara patent leather shoes and my favorite accessory, very colorful polka dot printed Jay McCarroll (Project Runway Season 1 Winner) socks!




Finally, for some "direct to camera" interviews, I wore a lime green sweater from Canadian brand Joe Fresh, a dark blue jacket from British designer Hardy Amies that once belonged to my uncle, and a red and green bow tie from Countess Mara. 

This was my first time ever at the Getty Villa and I was enchanted by the surroundings, and trying to take pictures while we had a break from filming:















And now, onto my "Nick's Take"/Inside Dish of the Episode:




















Naturally, Oscar was already done with his stunning "Gladiator Princess" look very early on, and so he began helping Natalia, making sure the team was on track to being a success.



Runway Time:








Oscar Garcia-Lopez: Simply stunning and oh-so-chic. This was a perfect modern interpretation of an upper class aristocratic, fashion-savvy woman living in Pompeii. I especially loved the back cape that hinted at the Gladiator's capes of the time. Oscar doubled the ENTIRE ensemble, which was a creme colored crepe, and finished it to perfection.










Natalia Fedner: Originally, Natalia wanted to hand-weave some silk chiffon and create some sort of a mini dress. I didn't agree with her weaving since it came out of nowhere and looked a bit wonky and unfinished. It took some time to convince her to "save her weaving technique for another day and challenge" but she did. I commend her for being a team player and I think the end product was a stunner! This floaty and ethereal dress was gorgeous.




Stephanie Ohnmacht: Originally Stephanie wanted to do big, wide palazzo pants in that printed chiffon. But after everyone decided that Natalia's design would be long and floaty, we all figured that having too long floaty styles would be repetitive so that's how the romper came to fruition. Here's another "Inside Dish": Stephanie wanted to sew that back "mini cape" onto the waist of the shorts; in other words, this wasn't going to be a cape at all, just an over piece in the back. I suggested that in order to give a "hint" of Oscar's Gladiator Princess cape in his final look, she should leave it out, loose. I'm glad she did.





Nick's Team!



OMG!!! Look at our reactions--I think our screams of joy almost gave Tim Gunn--and the judges--a heart attack! And I felt as if I just gave birth to a baby after 24 hours of labor!

Congratulations to my designers, well done! After so many weeks of feeling like the "Bad News Bears", this was a welcomed nice feeling.




And...Congratulations to Oscar who was the challenge winner for that gorgeous creme caped pant ensemble. Felicitaciones!

For this past week's Project Runway "Under The Gunn" episode--as stressful as it was--I still found time to dress up.  The theme was "Make a Stage Look for Zendaya". In case you missed my "Nick's Take" on the episode, click HERE. This post is about my fashion/looks, of course.




Nick Workroom Check-In Style: For this first day--when the challenge was announced and the designers had to create their look for Zendaya, I wore a pink striped "seersucker"-style jacket from Topman, a blue dress shirt with white collar from U.S. Polo Assn., Zara jeans, and silk pocket scarf from Etro:



















Thanks to my one-and-only NIKOLAKI design partner and unofficial stylist, David Paul, for styling me!

This week's episode of Lifetime Network's Project Runway "Under The Gunn" was another DOOZY. It seems that the "Nick-is-a-Bad-Mentor Train" has seen no end--to my surprise(!) since I LIVED it. Anyhow--I'll get to that, my shock and disappointment at the "story arc" and the "Throwing Isabelle Under the Bus" stuff--later in this blog. After all, this is my "Nick's Take"/Inside Dish...





This week's episode was to design a stage outfit for the one-and-only Zendaya, the beautiful 17 year-old sensation of music, dance and acting. Oh and yes, did I mention she has a 5' 10" model-like figure? First off: Zendaya is GORGEOUS and she was extremely sweet. On the show, while judging, she wore a red dress from Project Runway Season 4 Winner Christian Siriano. She looked fabulous. And I really LOVED her shoes: that girl's got STYLE! OK, so now, let's get to the "elephant in the room", Miss Isabelle:







Last week I alluded to the fact that something would "go down" with one of my designers--Isabelle Donola. Since the previous challenge I felt uneasy about her; I got a strong sense that:

A) she didn't want to be mentored;

B) she didn't want to be mentored by ME; and

C) she was a bit, well, "kooky" and not in a good way. EVERYONE involved with filming--the mentors, the rest of the designers, the production team, even Tim, we all knew it--and frankly, they told me so. And of course, I had to deal with her since she was my designer. But I didn't want to be a bad mentor and therefore I kept to my job at hand and tried to mentor and help her.









During the "Sketching Time", like the other two mentors, I was giving my "two cents" in terms of offering suggestions, ideas, etc. on how to design a stage outfit for the beautiful Zendaya. While I was doing that, Isabelle--one of my designers--turned to me and whispered for me to shut up. I was so taken aback, stunned and hurt--all at the same time, that I got up and moved away from ALL my designers. I felt a moment of sweetness when soon after that, Oscar (one of my other designers) then called on me to help him with ideas and style suggestions. Anyhow, this was the moment I felt that "I'm (almost) done" with Isabelle but for the sake of not looking like a fool mentor and not giving up, I (hesitantly) kept to my job at hand, to no avail, of course. I tried, and I still looked bad. During the model fitting--when every designer gets 30 minutes with their models--Isabelle fiddled and fuddled with trying to drape the top right on her model--but did nothing else; I knew it was going to be trouble the following day.










Day of Runway: I had received word from Tim that Isabelle was a mess. And this, naturally, worried me. I didn't want her to fail and I also didn't want the cameras/producers to make it look as if I failed as a mentor. So I continued on with Isabelle. After the makeup and hair time, the designers had thirty minutes to get it all done and Isabelle was still trying to put together her look--while most of the designers were done. Oscar, in fact, had finished his fabulous red sequined look THE NIGHT BEFORE.







I really think that Isabelle lives in "Isabelle World" and when we say that there's only fifteen minutes left, she thinks it's "TV Time" fifteen minutes; thinking it's all a "TV Lie" and they really give the designers TWO MORE DAYS; who knows, but this is the sense I got from her. Lots of designers who come to the "Project Runway" auditions say to us "Is it really six hours to make a dress?...that's 'TV Time' , you really give us THREE days...". Nope, not so mucheey. I think that Isabelle may have felt the same way. Tim had called "time is up" and Isabelle was still half-sewing her look while I stood there, with her model Ashleigh only wearing a white t-shirt and pink thong. She was stressed that she cut her finger. And naturally she blamed it on me for "stressing her out". She wouldn't be so stressed if she had utilized her time better.




Come On Ashleigh: Tim Gunn finally came in--as we quickly hurried to get Ashleigh dressed--even though the outfit was not even finished--but I did not want poor Ashleigh to actually walk down the runway naked. She almost did.











My Designers' Looks:


Natalia Fedner: I really liked Natalia's "Football"-inspired look. It was very "J. Lo 'In Living Color' Fly Girl". I loved that she added the "Z" in the back. But stylist Jen Rade was correct when she said that she looked like one of Zendaya's backup dancers as opposed to this being a look for THE STAR--Zendaya.




Oscar Garcia-Lopez: Oscar went for it--with no abandon and I was all for it! I thought the look was a bit too "Liza Minnelli-Meets-Cheerleader" but heck, I love those two references. He finished EVERYTHING and then made the stiff tulle bootie "chaps" with perfectly finished red bias binding.




Stephanie Ohnmacht: I was really supportive of Stephanie stepping out of her "pretty dress" box and creating a modern pant ensemble. Her Achilles Heel was the fabric. She chose a waxed "denim" that acted like pleather and was not easily mold-able. This was the first time she's ever made pants and I wanted to help her with the pant pattern but I learned my lesson a couple of challenges before; I almost went there to help her but I could just hear the cameras running to catch me helping and Tim chastising me. So, alas, I didn't go there.




Isabelle Donola: Isabelle's white satin jumpsuit was obviously the worst of the bunch. I was so embarrassed for her and mad that she had let it get to this point because of her "Isabelle World" behavior, not realizing the time she had, wasting time when she could have been actually working, her excuse of cutting her finger, and then eventually trying to throw me under the bus saying that I was the reason her look wasn't good or finished...







In the end, I have to say that I realized that Isabelle did not respect me, so therefore, how can I respect her. So when Tim Gunn asked ALL of the mentors for our thoughts after the judges gave their critiques, I was honest when I said that I'd rather spend my mentor energy on my other designers than on a designer that did not want my mentoring and did not want to be civil and respectful.

I definitely felt respect from all 3 of my other designers and I showed them admiration and support in return. At the moment, I never really thought my other 3 designers would think I would react to them like I reacted to Isabelle (but there is more on that in the next episode).



In retrospect, I realize that I should have been the bigger person and I let my emotions and the emotional crescendo that had occurred with Isabelle boil over. I now regret adding insult to injury when asked if I had anything to add. Hopefully Isabelle learned something positive from this experience and as a mentor I did too.



Onward and upward! Looking forward to a fun Team Challenge next week!