‘Project Runway’ Season 22 Episode 4 Live Recap: Who Was Eliminated?

Follow along to see who went home and how this week’s design competition stacks up.

Heidi Klum | JB Lacroix/Getty Images

The competition is getting intense on Season 22 of Project Runway, and with a double-elimination on the horizon, two designers will be saying “goodbye” to the contest this evening—along with their hopes of taking home the ultimate prize package.

This season’s winner will get a $200,000 cash prize, a spread in Elle magazine, mentorship with the Council of Fashion Designers of America and professional representation to launch their brand. However, there are still plenty of challenges left before Season 22’s winner is crowned, and tonight, host and judge Heidi Klum, mentor Christian Siriano and judges Tyra Banks and Law Roach continue to narrow down the competition.

What happened last week on Project Runway?

Last week’s episode of Project Runway left off on a major cliffhanger! The “In It to Win It” challenge required teams of three designers to pair up into four different fashion houses before creating runway looks inspired by NFL teams.

Ultimately, Team Panthers (made up of Joseph McRae, Naheim Muhammad and Aaron Potts) were deemed the winners of the challenge, while Team Falcons (consisting of Bryan Barrientos, Bi Pham and Elizabeth Shevelev) were also marked safe from elimination.

Meanwhile, that left six designers at risk of elimination, including everyone on Team Eagles (made up of Andriy Volkov, Bobby Diakonenkova and Jude Mikulencak) and Team Giants (including Jeffrey Kelly Abess, Anna Molinari and Chloe Magleby).

Read our full Episode 3 recap here.

Who was eliminated to start this week’s episode?

Episode 4 opened up following last week’s cliffhanger by sending home Magleby and Volkov following the team challenge. Molinari and Mikulencak were marked safe, as well as Abess and Diakonenkova, the four of whom will continue on in the competition.

What was this week’s challenge?

This week, designer’s are tasked with creating fierce looks inspired by animals. The “Catwalk on the Wild Side” challenge pieces will then be shown in front of Klum and the rest of the panel for scoring. In partnership with Humane World for Animals, five animals from five natural habitats serve as the inspo for looks crafted with cruelty-free fabrics.

To set things in motion, designers were paired against one another in sets of two while each head to head challenge was assigned a particular animal to serve as their design inspo:

• Potts vs. Molinari - lion
• Abess vs. Muhammad - shark
• McRae vs. Barrientos - macaw
• Pham vs. Mikulencak - wolf
• Shevelev vs. Diakonenkova - mustang

Additionally, stars of Hulu’s Get Real lineup will serve as models for the week, including Sarah Jane Nader, Charity Lawson, Veejay Floresca and Ekin-Su Cülcüloğlu. As the designers got to work, Siriano provided feedback, urging Mikulencak to push the envelope and encouraging Pham to “rethink” his design for Nader.

After the models were introduced (including—surprise!—Magleby, who stepped in for Stassi Schroeder last minute), the designers began fitting their looks for the runway with a few hiccups. While some of the models weren’t pleased with their ensembles, Molinari’s look required a complete resize due to the last-minute model change, while Pham and Mikulencak had to rework their looks as well.

Designers then presented their looks to Klum, Roach and Banks on the runway—with mixed reviews. While the designers certainly critiqued one another’s looks, the judges also shared a few knowing glances over a few questionable pieces.

Who won the challenge?

With this week’s head-to-head challenge format, a favored look was declared from each team, as follows, with a live vote from the judges:

• Potts vs. Molinari - lion
• Abess vs. Muhammad - shark
• McRae vs. Barrientos - macaw
• Pham vs. Mikulencak - wolf
• Shevelev vs. Diakonenkova - mustang

Thus, Potts, Pham, Barrientos, Shevelev and Abess were in the bottom, while Molinari and Mikulencak were declared the top two designers of the challenge. Ultimately, Mikulencak was deemed the favorite look of the week and the winner of the challenge.

Unfortunately, Pham, Barrientos and Potts found themselves in the bottom three and were up for elimination at the end of the episode. Barrientos received harsh feedback from Roach, who also called Potts’s look “disgusting” while referring to Pham’s look as a maxi pad.

Once again, this week’s episode left off on a cliffhanger. Stay tuned to see which designer is going home at the start of next week’s episode.

When is the next episode of Project Runway?

The next episode of Project Runway airs on Freeform on Thursday, Aug. 6, at 10 p.m. ET. Episodes are available to stream on Hulu and Disney+ the following day.

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