Job:02-30034 Title:RP-Fashion Design Ref and Spec Book
#175 Dtp:225 Page:218
210-223_30034.indd 218 3/5/13 6:38 PM
218 THE FASHION DESIGN REFERENCE + SPECIFICATION BOOK
(Text)
Where do you start with the design process when developing a new collection? And
why that first?
I work in an almost second-nature kind of process that’s both gratifying and mysteri-
ous. Sometimes it starts with sketches and sometimes it starts with fabric. And yet
it’s hard to pinpoint where the process begins because I’m so ingrained in it. I’m
always developing fabrics, I’m always developing ideas, so things overlap a great
deal. But there’s always a moment that catches you, and you say, Oh, this is it.
For example: I was coming home one evening two summers ago and I found a lunar
moth on my doorknob. It was the most incredibly ravishing thing I had ever seen
in my life, it took my breath away. So I discovered this crazy latent obsession with
insects. Even though I don’t think I scratched the surface, that’s all I thought about
and looked at for one year: insects. There’s something so classically motivating
about insects. Like the way the soft colors of the beating wings, a reflective grey-
orange, say, flutter around an intense central color like bright orange. Or the way
certain things connect on an insect, it’s otherworldly and also very mechanical. So
one thought leads to another thought leads to another thought, and my last collec-
tion was really about insects.
Of course, I’m obsessed with other things at the moment for my fall collection.
I’m always going back to Technicolor. I watch a lot of old movies; I grew up at the
Regency Theatre, at the Solaria. There’s something about the quality of color when
it’s projected onto a screen that’s impossible to emulate in real life, and yet I keep
trying. And every season I discover a way of doing it, one little personal triumph of
color that no one else notices.
Do you consider fashion an art form? a craft?
I am an artist, and that’s all I have to say about it. I know that my clothes are sup-
posed to sell, as opposed to a painter whose work is almost friggin’ not supposed
to. As an artist, you’re supposed to be dead when your work starts to sell, then
you’re really considered successful. Whereas for a fashion designer, there’s a prob-
lem if your clothes don’t sell while you’re alive. But I do think of myself as an artist.
Honestly, I think I could probably do better in the marketplace if I cared less about
artistic integrity.
D
th
T
w
e
lo
b
yo
th
lik
to
Ve
n
H
I
w
g
W
A
tu
ca
is
m
o
in
I’
in
g
o
PERSPECTIVES: ISAAC MIZRAHI
Job:02-30034 Title:RP-Fashion Design Ref and Spec Book
#175 Dtp:225 Page:218
210-223_30034.indd 218 3/5/13 6:37 PM
Job:02-30034 Title:RP-Fashion Design Ref and Spec Book
#175 Dtp:225 Page:219
Book
e:218
210-223_30034.indd 219 3/5/13 6:38 PM
(Text)
Did you have a mentor or mentors in the fashion industry? What have you taken away from
those relationships that serves you today?
The greatest mentor in my life was Perry Ellis. I didn’t know it at the time, which is probably
why it was so powerful, because it was taking place without my even noticing. When I was
emerging as a designer, the person I looked up to most in the world was Geoffrey Beene. I just
loved his work. Perry Ellis and Geoffrey Beene were not that different. They both had an off-
beat sense of proportion and an exquisite sense of fabric. One was much more sporty, easy,
young, and playful; the other was more couture, obsessive, lacey, and fancy. But, in the end,
they both had very quirky ways of looking at style, which is what affected me the most. I feel
like I learned my sense of grandeur from Ellis—in terms of what he exposed us to and how he
took grandeur and made it everyday. With Beene, too, the grandeur is very everyday. It’s not
Versailles like La Croix (who’s also a genius); it’s quieter, more intimate, like a beautiful Chi-
nese princess.
Have you assumed the role of mentor for someone else?
I might be a mentor, but we won’t know that until twenty, fifty years pass. There’s a girl that I
work with named Elizabeth, who I think is absolutely wonderful. She has great style, she’s a
great designer, and she’s very devoted. She’s absorbing, she’s learning.
What books or art are in your reference library?
A great friend of mine, Katell le Bourhis—a fabulous fashion curator, she ran the Met’s Cos-
tume Institute for a while, years ago—gave me this book about the poet Gabriele D’Annunzio
called Il Guardaroba di Gabriele d’Annunzio (The Closet of Gabriele D’Annunzio). He was a styl-
ish, stylish man. He was also a huge fascist. But he did have the most gorgeous clothes, the
most beautiful uniforms and boots and pajamas and toiletries. That’s one book I can’t do with-
out. I always was crazy about Cecil Beaton and all of those style books that he wrote, includ-
ing my bible, The Glass of Fashion. I keep all his books close at hand.
I’m mad about Richard Avedon’s photographs. His work from the 1950s and 1960s was a big
influence when I was in my twenties. I’m still inspired anytime I see them. There are some
great contemporary photographers and also a few crazy artists whose work I really love. I’m
obsessed with Jim Hodges.
Connect 219
Job:02-30034 Title:RP-Fashion Design Ref and Spec Book
#175 Dtp:225 Page:219
Book
e:218
210-223_30034.indd 219 3/5/13 6:37 PM
Job:02-30034 Title:RP-Fashion Design Ref and Spec Book
#175 Dtp:225 Page:220
210-223_30034.indd 220 3/5/13 6:38 PM
2 2 0 THE FASHION DESIGN REFERENCE + SPECIFICATION BOOK
(Text)
With an industry that is losing skilled craftspeople with every passing generation, what do you
think fashion education programs should include in their curriculum to best prepare designers
looking to enter the market?
That’s such a good question. I’m not an educator, so it’s difficult to say. It’s more about
what’s missing altogether. I often mourn the passing of something, like a costume collection
that is lost, or a standard that disappears because it’s too hard to do something a particular
way. I especially mourn the loss of books. People don’t buy books anymore, they buy Kindles;
they go online to look at pictures. But I treasure my books. There was a kind of rigor about
things years ago, a deeper knowledge, and less pop focus. Not that pop’s bad—if anyone’s
responsible for that in fashion it’s me.
How does the issue of sustainability affect your design process?
That’s a paradigm that is shifting glacially, at least in my world. I’m kind of worshipful of peo-
ple who can do sustainable design really well. There’s a girl in Berkeley, California, who makes
only clothes that are sustainable, and I can’t believe how great she is. I admire her work to the
end of the earth. But, personally, unless I’m really captivated and excited and motivated, it’s
meaningless. If I work with sustainable materials and integrate them into my process, it can’t
be a dogma. It has to be, Oh look, we can now do this glamorous thing sustainably, hooray! I
won’t lose the glamour, the glitter, and the fluff just because it’s not sustainable. Reform has
to come as part of beautiful design, as part of an organic design process. And by the way, the
minute you start recycling something, someone says, No, no, no, that’s not the way you do it.
There are all kinds of controversies about what is and isn’t sustainable. So once everybody
knows exactly what’s going on, I’m for it. I just don’t see it as the be-all and end-all.
You have been very successful at diversifying the Isaac Mizrahi message without diluting it.
You’ve reached customers at Target, at luxury retailers like Bergdorf Goodman, and now at
Liz Claiborne with equal power. What does a designer need to do this well?
I can’t describe that for anyone else. I swear to God, I don’t know how I became who I am.
Perry Ellis would take us to Mr. Chow’s occasionally and he’d point to Tina Chow and say,
She’s wearing a Chanel couture skirt with a Hanes T-shirt and she looks amazing. I realized
that smart people don’t just buy designer clothes and wear them, they actually get involved.
They actually think the way I think about clothes: that a beautiful design is more valuable than
any so-called luxury label. Luxury is relative. There’s nothing more luxurious than a good idea,
nothing more luxurious than a good color.
Yo
co
H
A
e
b
w
ca
th
im
fe
O
Job:02-30034 Title:RP-Fashion Design Ref and Spec Book
#175 Dtp:225 Page:220
210-223_30034.indd 220 3/5/13 6:37 PM
Job:02-30034 Title:RP-Fashion Design Ref and Spec Book
#175 Dtp:225 Page:221
Book
e:220
210-223_30034.indd 221 3/5/13 6:38 PM
(Text)
s
e
e
n
Your diversification goes beyond clothing. You’ve just written a book, you’ve created a
comic book, a television program, a cabaret act, and an engaging video blog on Facebook.
How important is this kind of multifaceted self-expression for a designer today?
All these types of expression are important for me. Whether they’re important for other design-
ers, I don’t know. There are designers with far more successful design companies than mine
because they don’t do it. I don’t think Miuccia Prada gives a damn about her blog, if you know
what I mean. Yet there’s Michael Kors, who’s been a judge on Fashion Runway, or whatever it’s
called, and he does really well and it’s great exposure for him. Those of us who can do these
things—hooray for us. But I don’t think it’s exclusively good to do one thing or another. It’s
important to make your own way in the world. Really, my best advice to designers is to do what
feels good and what they like. Don’t be afraid, because you figure it out as you go along.
Overleaf Spring 2009 and Fall 2009 Collections. Sketches courtesy of Isaac Mizrahi; photographs
by Dan Lecca.
Connect 2 21
Job:02-30034 Title:RP-Fashion Design Ref and Spec Book
#175 Dtp:225 Page:221
Book
e:220
210-223_30034.indd 221 3/5/13 6:37 PM
Job:02-30034 Title:RP-Fashion Design Ref and Spec Book
#175 Dtp:225 Page:222
210-223_30034.indd 222 3/5/13 6:38 PM
Job:02-30034 Title:RP-Fashion Design Ref and Spec Book
#175 Dtp:225 Page:222
210-223_30034.indd 222 3/5/13 6:37 PM
..................Content has been hidden....................
You can't read the all page of ebook, please click here login for view all page.