In an interview for Success
magazine, fashion designer, film-maker, actor, opera director and cabaret
artist Isaac Mizrahi said, “My piano teacher said, ‘You have to choose what you
want. You can’t continue to study the piano for eight hours a day and be an
actor and design clothes.’ I listened to what he said and he made sense, but I
couldn’t relate to that model. I am not a specialist.”
He says he’s had insomnia
since he was twelve but a lot of his inspiration comes to him in dreams. And he
embraces the fact that he is easily bored: “I think it’s just a way of being in
the world. Some people just like to do a lot of things.”
Another potential drawback
he turned into a plus: as a fat kid he felt he couldn’t wear fashionable
clothes and shoes, so he designed them instead.
He also embraces his lack of
one identifiable signature style, saying, “I always try to think of something
fresh, something innovative, and it almost comes from this weird psychic place.”
He doesn’t mind risks,
either. For a name designer to associate himself with Target, as he did, was
definitely a risk but it’s been a huge success.
Here’s the advice that sums
it all up: “Do what you want—don’t let anyone tell you to do a version of what
you want. Do exactly that you want, then wait it out...” Of his own next
venture (directing a film) he says, “I don’t know if I’ll be good at it, but I
know I’ll like doing it. If someone thinks I’m good, then I’m really happy
about it.”
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