Jason Wu
I came from product design originally - I had been designing dolls for a toy company since I was 16 - so I'm used to working with plastic and different things. I had an innate interest in objects.Collection: Design
Brizo has been my single biggest sponsor since I began as a designer. Brizo wanted to be involved in many different areas of design - they had already worked with several architects, and fashion was an area they were interested in moving into.Collection: Design
My favorite thing about Taiwan is the food.Collection: Food
It's quite a pure relationship, designer and muse. I think a beautiful dress on the wrong woman could mean nothing. It has to be the right woman and the right clothes. That's why you need that personal touch.Collection: Relationship
There is always going to be that luxury customer out there. I have clients who buy $10,000 dresses and clients who buy $60 dresses. It's not so much about the money. Design is a mentality.Collection: Design
We all want to be a little glamorous, a little playful and a little mischievous at times.
I call white the most powerful non-color; it's clean, optimistic, powerful.
I think clothing is transformative. When you put something really beautiful on, you feel something. In so many ways, we're always playing a form of dress-up - it's just a grown-up, much chicer version of it. It's nice to be able to be whoever you want to be.
I am an Asian designer. I was born in Taiwan. That is who I am. But I am a designer, like any designer of any race. Growing up in the '80s in Taiwan, the arts were not considered a career.
I made a rule not to be on reality shows.
My Chinese zodiac is a dog. But I'm an exception because of how much I love cats.
I never thought of myself as being limited to fashion. I'm a designer, and if you have a vision, you can apply that to anything.
My cats are really sassy and sophisticated, but most importantly, they are picky.
I don't believe that you have to dress in a masculine way to seem powerful. I think that the way a woman dresses doesn't have to be so aggressive. Being feminine is a powerful feature in itself. Power is in a person's demeanor.
My inspirations come from everywhere. It's important to look at everything and anything. I think what I create is serious fashion, but I don't want to keep my focus on that. You have to look at a lot of different things. I mean, people are always surprised when they find out that my favorite show is 'RuPaul's Drag Race.'
I would buy Barbies and take them apart and then remake their looks. I used them for hairstyling. It was a whole process. I had a lot of dolls - like 150.
There's something to be said about a girl who knows what she wants. One of my favorite girls to dress is Diane Kruger. It's always so easy with her. I know her body and what works. When it's right, it's not a lot of effort.
I hope I am the antithesis of disposable fashion.
A lot happened in Vancouver. It was my first Western experience. I learned English, which is my second language. I became very acquainted with Western culture. I had my first sewing machine when I was 9. I trained in fashion illustration when I was in school.
I saw my potential as artistic director, which is very different from designer. Fashion companies might have $200 million to $300 million in annual sales - Hugo Boss has €2.5 billion. I have to create a world that is believable and also relevant in 7,000 sales points around the world.
I have been wanting to do beauty for years and to pair with an international beauty company. It will solidify the image of Jason Wu as a world. All my shows have a distinctive hair and makeup look. It feels so natural for me; the woman who wears my clothes would have my makeup as part of her beauty regime.
I don't feel comfortable talking about the specifics of how it all comes together, but the truth is, I don't ever know when Michelle Obama is going to wear my clothes! She, like everyone else, picks her outfits and wears them when she wants - sometimes two or three times. It's not ever calculated.
Designers have always shown outlandish and exuberant clothes, but that hasn't always translated to the streets.
A perfectly fitted sheath dress that can take you from day to night is something that every woman should have in her closet. You can't go wrong with black, but a little bit of color is nice. I love a lot of color, personally. You can accessorize a sheath dress. Look at how Michelle Obama accessorizes clothes to make them her own.
Being feminine in the way you dress doesn't have to compromise who you are as a woman or your career.
I worked 10 years as a toy designer before I started my career as a fashion designer. It's something I just fell into and really liked.
That's the fun thing about fashion: it changes. One day, we're into short, the next we're into full length for day, or half short and long.
I've been known to create clothes that are very formfitting and feminine.
I've always loved the rustic, slightly worn style of Canvas and that element of an artisanal hand. It's so inherently chic.
A lot of my peers don't think about collaborating the way I do. My approach is to imagine my world. The Jason Wu woman isn't just floating around in a beautiful dress. I like to know where she's going, what she likes. I'm not just in the fashion business. I'm in the lifestyle business.
When I moved to America, I knew I wanted to be a designer. I never imagined one of my dresses would end up in the Smithsonian.
I happen to like selling clothes as much as creating them. It isn't relevant unless it sells.
The Taiwanese are big on tea. I think it's nice to slow down a bit. It's very much a custom.
My mom is a really good cook. We used to make dumplings together.
I make very proper clothes. But I was never that person. For a long time, I thought that was the image I needed to have for my brand. And I thought that's the person that I needed to be. Because it gave me a distinct image that no one can deny.
I'm an American designer. It's important to riff on that. I remember, when my mom and I first came to the States, she was so shocked that everyone was so dressed down in sandals and shorts. It's not quite like that in Asia. To give that a superluxurious makeover? For me to make street wear? It's sort of chic to do it.
I dress some of the most successful women in the world, and meeting these women rubs off on you. A few years ago, the woman was someone I imagined in my head. Now they're real. It's important my work evolve along with me and that I show more facets of myself.
My inspirations come from everywhere. It's important to look at everything and anything.Collection: Inspiration
Buy things you truly love, things that are special, but not a lot of them. It’s about value, not quantity.Collection: Special
When I was 12 or 13 I already knew that I was gay. And then my interests were not conventional. So I was very different, in every sense of the word. And in an all-boys school, that's tough.Collection: School
I hope being gay isn't the most interesting thing about me.Collection: Gay
As a designer you have to just do whatever you want to do. The second I came to terms with that, it transformed my work.Collection: Want
The idea of transformation is super-important to me. You can see it in the way I approach things. I have never been a clean-faced, freshly scrubbed hair person. I'm the New York designer who doesn't do that. I think about the hair and makeup almost as much as I think about the clothes because it all has to work.Collection: New York
I think what I create is serious fashion, but I don't want to keep my focus on that. You have to look at a lot of different things. I mean, people are always surprised when they find out that my favorite show is RuPaul's Drag Race.Collection: Fashion
I need to feel like I'm part of something. I need to feel part of the world when I go to sleep.Collection: Sleep
It's nice to be able to be whoever you want to be. I moved to New York for that reason. I think I am a very good example of how you really can do whatever you want to do without having any kind of prerequisite experience of any of kind of connection. None of my family members came from this world.Collection: New York
I had a hard time in middle school. I was never really quite me until I was 16 or 17, and things like bullying didn't matter anymore.Collection: Bullying
My parents loved me, and I think they realized that I was probably not going to have a normal 9-to-5 job. For the longest time, my dad thought that I was just going to be home until I was, like, 35, which, weirdly, is completely normal in Asian families.Collection: Jobs
I didn't understand anything about fashion until I moved to Canada when I was 9. That's when I learned English and was exposed to fashion magazines like Harper’s Bazaar and Vogue.Collection: Fashion
I love the idea of working with women because I always feel like a man designing womenswear needs women around him to really have a sense of what they're doing.Collection: Men