I'm not a chef. But I'm passionate about food - the tradition of it, cooking it, and sharing it.
Zac Posen
I want to make things of quality. I'm a big believer in handmade, tactile, crafted pieces. I want to keep that tradition alive.
There's a reason good fabrics have a cost. They're done with good quality to last.
I'm a pretty controlled and disciplined person, but my real vice is buying plants and food shopping.
At the end of the day, you can't compete with Mother Nature. If you've got a great tomato, just a pinch of sea salt is all you need.
Everybody wants to be a star right now, to be heard, to have a voice, so you have to give the confidence for people to have that ability - and give them the wardrobe to become a star.
Beyond fashion, I think that culture has a side where they love to shoot you up like a clay pigeon and then take out their rifles. I lived that, and I got to see the perspective from up in the sky.
Food is everything. Food, friends, family: Those are the most important things in life.
Fashion is killing women's body image of themselves.
I try to push design boundaries using new draping and fabric manipulation techniques every time I approach a new design.
As an object itself, to me, books today are such a rare entity - I want mine to be something where, if left on the kitchen table, a child could pick it up. It can visually tell a story.
When I'm on the road for fashion shows, I love room service. I think it's one of the greatest things in the world. I usually like to keep it simple with soup, but my big indulgence is French fries or chicken fingers.
A great trick for frying is to put a popcorn kernel in the oil, and when it pops, you're ready to fry.
I don't wear flip-flops, so my casual shoe is a Brooks Brothers tuxedo slipper!
Obviously, I like very beautiful food, because I think as delicious as food has to taste, it also has to look very beautiful - the process of presentation is very important.
As a little boy, my mom would bake with me on the weekends - that was our time together.
I think that maybe growing up and being dyslexic early on, the visual quality of cookbooks specifically was something very enticing to me.
I feel very fortunate that I make everything I wear head to toe every day.
I don't cook ribs in my own home. I let my dad cook the ribs. He's from St. Louis, Missouri. I like to use a grill, but that's my dad's domain.
I have to bring my A-Game 24/7, between creating, draping, and overseeing a myriad of different brands.
I'm quite a tuxedo junkie, I collect them all year round.
Taking sartorial risks and not following other people is what makes you stand out.
If you're entering into fashion in an original way, you have to know your craft, and you have to know your history. You have to be obsessively dedicated. You have to be relentless about making it happen. It doesn't take a bank. It takes passion, love, timing, and luck.
I was not a young fashion victim. I really had an idea of what I liked in fashion and how I dressed.
Sometimes, late at night on the set of 'Project Runway,' I've been known to pop an interpretive dance.
Authenticity from a person and product is absolutely essential.
For me, I'll unwind at the end of the day by soaking in Epsom salts. It's the routine I prefer for coming down after crazy days.
I truly believe that you can't be a successful business unless there are hiccups. That American mentality of picking yourself up, brushing your shoulders off, and then really going for it makes you 100 times stronger and smarter.
When I first got to Brooks Brothers, my mom told me she remembered how upsetting it was trying to find professional clothes in the eighties. Suits would either be over-stylized or frumpy, so she said, 'Make sure it's tailored properly.'
I like films that probe emotional questions and inspire you to get creative and get writing, get draping, painting, cooking, whatever that thing is where you have that kind of output.
I love creative people.
When you make and drape clothing, the scissors are your tool. What can I say about them? They're my babies. And you have to take care of them correctly. You have to have them sharpened, and you can't use them for any other material.
I think it's really important to try to eat seasonally as much as possible. It helps put people in touch with what's happening locally and with nature.
I was very interested in theatre, so my first love of fashion comes from costume, and I think that's pretty clear within my work and the level of theatricality.
With Zac Posen gowns, it's like making an ornate pastry. Then, sometimes, it's just great to have the perfect chicken soup or consomme. And that's Brooks Brothers.
I go online at night and I order flowers, rare flowers, and then they come in the mail. That's my fashion detox.
Don't worry about what's cool and what's not cool. Authenticity is what's cool.
I cherish my time off and the solitude that comes along with it.
I was born and raised on 'Singin' in the Rain.' It's in my work. It's in me.
I'm definitely planning ahead for a brand that spans the universe - a Zac Posen universe.
I garden in my Brooks Brothers pajamas and straw hat.
One of my fantasies is to produce 'Auntie Mame' as a play.
The practice of patience in crafting and process is a virtue that needs to come back.
To be able to buy a plant and plant it, that's a luxury to me.
There's not one major greatest influence on my career. It would be film and great artists and great imagineers - Jim Henson, Walt Disney, Charlie Chaplin, people who understand the joy of the imagination.
I am a compulsive and concise shopper.
I think, mind over body, it's real.
I try to be the best that I can be and the best to the people that work for me.
When I was little, I had a Norwegian babysitter - and that was my introduction to both regular and salty licorice. We all know the ordinary version, but the salty kind is a favorite candy throughout Northern Europe. It's a guilty pleasure of mine that I have to try not to keep around because I'll eat the entire bag in one go.
The way I cut my clothing... it is about empowerment and loving the curves of the body.
