Friday's taping of Lifetime’s Project Runway season finale started fashionably late. Five minutes before its scheduled start time, fashionistas, paparazzi and camera crews were still snapping, chatting and SnapChatting all over the very runway that models would soon walk down.
The show began with the show's top model, Project Runway host and executive producer Heidi Klum, walking down the runway with fellow judges Nina Garcia of Marie Claire, fashion designer Zac Posen and surprise guest judge Emmy Rossum of Showtime’s Shameless. The quartet stopped at the end of the runway to smile for the photogs.
Former America's Next Top Model judge Nigel Barker was spotted in the front row, a few seats away from the judges.
The hour-long show ran a little over an hour, with full collections from the top nine designers of Project Runway’s13th season. The Fashion Week footage will air Oct. 23 at 9 p.m. in a two-part finale, which will crown a winner. Contestants Alexander Knox, Amanda Valentine, Char Glover, Emily Payne, Fade Zu Grau, Kini Zamora, Korina Emmerich, Sandhya Garg and Sean Kelly showed designs featuring crop tops, fringe accents and mid-length skirts galore.
Contestants began their shows with excited hollers and applause from the crowd, thanking their family, friends and fellow contestants, whom Emmerich said she dedicated her collection to. Each had four weeks and $9,000 to make their Spring 2015 collection.
The event was capped off with the ever-composed Tim Gunn taking the plunge into the ALS-supporting ice bucket challenge. The Project Runway mentor originally tried to get out of the dousing by sipping a Manhattan cocktail with ice, but Klum, who nominated Gunn, insisted he do the real-deal instead. Klum called for "more water," which was brought out from backstage along with a clear plastic tarp for Gunn to stand on.
After Gunn was splashed he hugged Klum showing there were no bad feelings.
Despite being one of reality's longest-running shows, Project Runway is stilla soliddraw. The current season is averaging 2 million total viewers and has ticked up slightly in recent weeks, according to Nielsen figures. The show also ranks in the top 10 most social TV shows, according to General Sentiment analytics, with a second-screen score for the Aug. 28 airing of 5,543.
