Project Style Live Style Off

Saturday was the live style off round for the Project Style contest I was in. It was held at my local mall and hosted by Nick Verreos. How our mall managed that, I will never know. It was such a fun event. They first brought the 3 other contestants and me on stage and chatted a little about our style and whatnot.





I had no idea what to say. I hate having to describe what my style is, since I'm not even really sure myself. I should have said "bi-polar" because it's always changing and I love so many different types of styles that I can't settle on just one.

After that, they let us loose in the mall with $200 gift cards to pick out a complete outfit within an hour. Talk about stress. I had gone to the mall a couple days before hand to try to scout out my plan of attack like a war general, but I ended up leaving even more unsure with what kind of look I wanted to go for. It's sort of like when someone asks you, "What's your favorite movie?" and your mind goes completely blank and you can't think of any movie you watched in the past ever. That was how this was for me. It was like my mind turned into an lolcat saying, "clothez, wut iz they?" and completely forgot how to dress myself. I told myself, "do not go into Forever 21. Do NOT go into Forever 21." as I headed straight into Forever 21.

It's not that I don't like Forever 21, because I do. I have plenty of clothes from there, but I felt like it was just the obvious choice. But I panicked and just started grabbing stuff. For some reason I really wanted to wear a chunky scarf because I thought it was totally fall-ish, and I wanted to wear ankle boots. Then I blacked out and woke up on stage wearing this outfit.







Just kidding, I didn't black out, but this is what I ended up picking out. As I got back to the stage and saw the look of sheer disappointment on my family's faces when they saw what I picked out, I knew I dun goofed. Don't get me wrong, I love this outfit. It's me and it's completely what I would wear, but in hindsight, it's probably not an outfit that's going to win a "trendsetting" contest, yaknowwhaddimean? Let's watch as I try to explain my ensemble:






Yeah. If you want to win a contest solely on an outfit, you probably shouldn't describe it as "basic" or "casual" or "not too over-the-top" which I said three times. I described my outfit as plain and boring three. different. times. Here, watch it again at a different angle:



I could have just spent my gift card on a wet blanket and it would have matched the description I gave my outfit. Of course, hindsight is always 20/20 and you can spend hours thinking of things you should have said or should have picked out instead (which I have. for hours.) But this is still an outfit I'd wear, so I ain't even trippin'. I think if anything, this made me realize how simple my style actually is.

Let me stop here to tell you how much this contest made me feel like a secret agent. First, I was on a mission, and that mission was timed. It was me against the clock. and second, we had to come back wearing our new outfit. They let us loose and let us fend for ourselves to find somewhere to change. So where did I change? I changed in a Macy's dressing room. I didn't even buy anything from Macy's, how did I even end up there? and it was the dressing room on the second floor. I went to the most out of the way place to change. I went full retard. And then, if that wasn't bad enough, I started thinking how suspicious it would look if I just walked into a fitting room with bags of clothes. So naturally I picked something off a random rack and slyly slipped into the dressing room. It wasn't even a dressing room with an attendant that passes out numbers or unlocks a room for you. It was a self-service dressing room that I brought a pair of pants into, that probably weren't even my size, that I had no intentions of trying on.

So I start to walk into the handicap room because it's the biggest, but then I thought that would be bad karma in case someone who really was handicapped came in and couldn't use it because I was Clark Kenting it up in there. So I start going through my bags, which are the loudest bags ever, by the way. They might as well have bagged my stuff in a biodegradable Sun Chips bag so I could have drawn even more attention to the fact I was suspiciously rummaging through bags in a dressing room. So I start ripping off tags and realized my boots were joined together by an elastic band. And I had no sharp objects. You know how they say with enough adrenaline you could lift a car? Well, apparently with enough adrenaline you can rip apart an elastic band with your own bare hands.

So I get changed and I walk out (making sure to ditch the pants on the "they didn't work out" rack) and it's kind of the most badass feeling walking out in a completely different outfit than what you went in wearing. I felt like I was 007 in a pullover sweater. Then I made my way back to the contest, where I lost. Hard. Like, bottom 2 hard.

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But honestly, I wasn't even bummed. It was a lot of fun, and I was so excited to have just made it that far. I mean, c'mon I got to walk a runway and hang out with Nick Verreos? I think I'm the one that made out in this deal. So thank you all who voted for me in the semi-finals to get me that far. This opportunity was everything. And just as a thank you, I will treat you with Nick Verreos' uh-mazing runway walk.