TED 2008 — Isaac Mizrahi

(I'm liveblogging from TED 2008, in Monterey, CA)

Presenter: fashion designer Isaac Mizrahi, on inspiration.

Img 0221Where does inspiration come from? Not from research. It comes from lying awake at night. I don't know where it comes from. [He's going to try anyway.]

Color is something that motivates me. It's rarely a color that I find in nature. I'm inspired by the color of movies. I watch women in movies a lot. I think about their roles. I look at the way woman are portrayed and glorified (sometimes ironically), and denigrated or ironically denigrated. How can I make anything as beautiful as Natalie Wood or Greta Garbo? That's what keeps me up at night.

Balance of irony and earnestness. Skinny and fat. Balance is what its really about, that is part of my process.

I go to astrologers and tarot card readers a lot. I do what they tell me to do. Once a fortune teller told me I would meet a someone named Eric. I would go to bars and anyone named Eric I would be humping a lot.

I don't say that I do everything well, I try to do a lot of things. I try not to look back, but sometimes I do and think "what a fool!"

I don't think of myself as a fashion designer. I think of myself — uh I don't know what I think of myself, so that's that.

In fashion, you always have to be slightly bored with everything. If you aren't, you have to pretend you are. But I am always slightly bored. I don't like to be bored. I play computer bridge.

I had a TV show, and that was a very big part of my process. [Shows a clip from his show, with some guy cutting Rosie O'Donnel's hair.]

I like to cook. I look at things like they are food. I always relate things to kitchenry. Everything boils down to that.