Rose Marie Wilson rules the runway

Nadine Kam photos
Model Ellen Baron wears a dress by Lehua Rabelas, behind her, who was the third-place winner in The Bella Project's "Rule the Runway" competition.

The Bella Project launched its first "Rule the Runway" competition Nov. 17 at The Venue on Bethel St. with 15 Hawaii designers showing their best prom-worthy designs, created from old prom dresses no contemporary girl would even want to touch.

Preliminaries began in September, with designers entering for a spot in the competition. From 23 hopefuls, the field was narrowed to 15 who showed their work on stage.

I was one of the judges, along with hairdresser Paul Brown, and designers Roberta Oaks and Andy South. Malika Dudley was the emcee for the evening, and I was marveling at her corkscrew locks before the show. I thought she had it done on site, but she said her hair is naturally curly. I never would have guessed from her perfectly straight locks on Hawaii News Now, but curly hair doesn't work with green screen. Empty spaces end up looking like holes, like a Swiss cheese.

Judging these things is kind of scary. The models go by so fast, and it's only when they get close on stage that you can see some of the details, and in just a few minutes we had to judge on creativity, workmanship, original dress content (at least three yards), wearability and some other criteria.

Images of the original dresses were projected on a screen, so we could see how much they varied, or didn't vary enough, from the original.


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The "Project Runway" plague of crooked hemlines abounded on this runway, and there were a lot of lining fabrics sticking out beyond the skirts, that weren't pretty enough to be intentional. Just in case, we had the opportunity to ask five finalists about their creations before final judging.

From our initial scores, the five finalists were Thomas Downes, Malia Flores, Lauren Lee, Lehua Rabelas and Rose Marie Wilson. Judging was blind, but I was already familiar with Thomas and Lauren's work. They were classmates at Honolulu Community College and Lauren is a star in the niche world of Lolita fashion. I'd also interviewed Malia before, based on her business of making diaper soakers. She said her pink prom dress was her first dress creation, and after the event was over, she asked me if I recognized the diaper pant snaps she used for the back of her dress! (No, I didn't make that connection.)

When Rose Marie was announced as the winner, I pounced on her right away, as in "Who are you? Where did you come from? How come I don't know you?"

She said she knew she was the oddball in the competition because all the other designers were about the same age, or came out of HCC, or knew each other. She said she's just liked sewing since she was in the third grade. She's helped create dresses and wedding gowns for friends over the years, but hadn't pursued it as a career.

Her fabric was velvet, which isn't easy to work with because of its weight and nap. She employed the long over short trick to give her dress a little buoyancy, creating a short dress with a scalloped hem, with a detachable skirt overlay in a lighter color and fabric. Her tailoring was impeccable.

Congratulations all, and congratulations to Bella Project founder Amanda Ross and her team for a job well done, and one more venue for new designers to share their work.

Before final judging, second-place winner Thomas Downes talked about his dyed fabric and use of feathers on his dress worn by Lauren Landry.

Rose Marie Wilson takes her winner's walk down the runway with her model Que Gibson.

Fellow judge Roberta Oaks, left, with the evening's emcee Malika Dudley.

From left, the Bella Project founder and executive director Amanda Ross, with second place finisher Thomas Downes and his model, designer and judge Andy South, and "Rule the Runway" winner Rose Marie Wilson.

Malia Flores, right, was a finalist with this pink dress that marked her first attempt at dressmaking.