Project Runway Season 7 is the seventh season of the television show Project Runway. The first episode aired on January 14, 2010, on Lifetime. Season 7 featured the return of the show to New York City, following a move to Los Angeles for Season 6. Returning as judges are supermodel Heidi Klum, fashion designer Michael Kors, and Marie Claire fashion director Nina Garcia. Tim Gunn returned as a mentor to the aspiring designers. The winner of this season, Seth Aaron Henderson received an editorial feature in an issue of Marie Claire magazine, a cash prize of $100,000 to start a personal line line, an opportunity to sell the line on Bluefly.com, and a $50,000 technology suite from Hewlett-Packard to create, design, and run a business. The winning model of this season will receive a $25,000 cash prize and take part in the winning designer's fashion spread in Marie Claire. In 2012, Anthony Williams and Mila Hermanovski competed on Project Runway All Stars (season 1), with Anthony placing 9th and Mila placing 6th of 13. Also in 2012, Emilio Sosa competed on Project Runway All Stars (season 2) and again was the runner-up. In 2013, Seth Aaron Henderson competed in Project Runway All Stars (season 3) and won the competition. In 2014, Jay Sario competed in Project Runway All Stars (season 4) placing 6th of 14. In 2018, Anthony Williams once again competed on Project Runway All Stars (season 6) and won the competition. In 2019, Seth Aaron Henderson returned for a third time to compete on Project Runway All Stars (season 7) against worldwide Project Runway winners. Seth Aaron placed 13th of 14. In 2023, Mila Hermanovski competed on Project Runway (season 20), placing 13th of 14.

Contestants

===Models ===

Challenges

Models of the Runway

Designer legend

Episodes

Episode 1: Back to New York

Original Airdate: January 14, 2010 The designers were asked to create a garment that represents who they are as a designer. They selected five fabrics each from a wide selection provided by Mood. The designers were preassigned models for their challenge and given one day to complete their design.

Episode 2: The Fashion Farm

Original Airdate: January 21, 2010 The designers were asked to create a party look from a burlap potato sack for their models to wear to an industry event. As the clients for this round, the models were allowed to choose their designers.

Episode 3: The Highs and Lows of Fashion

Original Airdate: January 28, 2010 The designers were taken to the Metropolitan Museum of Art and shown ten iconic looks by famous designers such as Yves Saint Laurent, Christian Dior, Madame Grès, and Cristóbal Balenciaga. They were then asked to create a high-end signature look worthy of a master collection. The designers were placed in teams of two and given $500 per team to create their looks. As the winner of the last challenge, Jay was automatically a team leader. Tim drew the names of the other team leaders via a random lottery; those team leaders then selected their partners in the order they were chosen, as indicated in the table below. On the second day of the challenge, the teams were asked to create a second "look for less", using only 10% of the budget for the first look and inspired by the signature look of one of the other teams. Heidi mentioned, when about to eliminate one of the bottom four designers, that two of them might be out.

Episode 4: Design Your Heart Out

Original Airdate: February 4, 2010 The designers were asked to design a look for a Fashion Week gala. The looks were required to feature the color red and elements with Campbell's branding, and were modeled by women who had been impacted by heart disease. Designers had a budget of $100 to purchase fabrics and other elements and one day of time to finish the design. The winning garment was produced and sold on projectrunway.com, with proceeds going to the American Heart Association.

Episode 5: Run for Cover

Original Airdate: February 11, 2010 The designers were asked to design an outfit for the cover of Marie Claire magazine. The winning design was worn by Heidi Klum on the cover of the April 2010 issue.

Episode 6: A Little Bit of Fashion

Original Airdate: February 18, 2010 The designers were asked to create a fashionable children's look to be modeled by a group of girls aged 5–9. Later the designers were asked to create an additional companion look for their adult models.

Episode 7: Hard Wear

Original Airdate: March 4, 2010 The designers were asked to create an innovative look and an accessory from materials sourced from a hardware store.

Episode 8: The Elements of Fashion

Original Airdate: March 11, 2010 The designers were asked to create a look inspired by one of the four classical elements: Earth, Water, Air, and Fire. As the winner of the last challenge, Jay was allowed to choose his own element. After that, two designers were allotted to each element. The designers got to choose their element in the order in which Tim drew their names out of a bag. The designers and their elements were as follows:

Episode 9: Takin' It To The Streets

Original Airdate: March 18, 2010 The designers were asked to create looks inspired by a distinctive New York City neighborhood. They were divided into four teams of two, with Tim drawing the names of team leaders at random. Each team was responsible for creating a day look and an evening look. The teams and their neighborhoods were as follows (team leaders are named first):

Episode 10: Hey, That's My Fabric

Original Airdate: March 25, 2010 The designers were asked to design and create their own print fabric as the basis for their looks.

Episode 11: Sew Much Pressure

Original Airdate: April 1, 2010 The designers were asked to create a red-carpet look for Heidi Klum. Maya chose to withdraw from the competition because she felt that she was too young and was not developed enough as a designer. Since Maya withdrew from the competition, Anthony was brought back, and won the challenge along with Emilio. This challenge marked a record-breaking third consecutive win for Emilio.

Episode 12: The Big, Top Designers

Original Airdate: April 8, 2010 The designers were asked to create a look inspired by the Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus. Jay and Mila were both kept in the competition and asked to design collections, but only one of them would show at Fashion Week. This challenge boosted Emilio's own record from three consecutive wins to four.

Episode 13: Finale – Part 1

Original Airdate: April 15, 2010 Four designers were given budget of $9000 and four months to finish a ten piece collection for New York Fashion Week. Tim Gunn visited the four remaining designers as they worked on their collections at home. When the designers returned to New York, Mila and Jay were asked to show three looks on the runway for the judges to decide which one of them would show at Fashion Week.

Episode 14: Finale – Part 2

Original Airdate: April 22, 2010 Three finalists work the last part of preparation, including model casting and hair and makeup counseling, for the final New York Fashion Week. Each showed their collection at Fashion Week before the winner of Project Runway Season 7 was announced. Although not televised, all the seasons contestants showed collections to prevent the audience from leaking the identities of the three finalists.

Episode 15: Reunion Special

Original Airdate: April 22, 2010 A half-hour show after airing of Project Runway Season 7 Finale, hosted by Tim Gunn and Nina Garcia. All 16 designers and 16 models gathered together to talk about the events on the show and off camera scenes. There are a few highlights in this reunion episode: Designers being disloyal to their models, the conflict between Ping and Jesse, Anthony's controversial comments about Mila, Cerri's negative comments about Jay's design, Maya's withdrawal from competition, and others. Maya was also awarded the Fan Favourite prize.