I lived in South America when I was growing up. I spent hours sketching. I was good at drawing, and I was obsessed with fashion, but I was also obsessed with magazines.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
I wanted to get out of this country and experience different ways of seeing the world. So I went to Europe, but I went as an artist. I was increasing my skill set and exploring storytelling through painting.
I actually started modeling in Ethiopia, because that's where I grew up, and I started out by just doing little fashion shows for school, and I liked it so much that I started pursuing it.
From 17 to 21, I was obsessed by sport and art. In art, I loved the pre-Raphaelites and Rembrandt first. Then I discovered Salvador Dali, and it was like finding something I already knew.
I was always fascinated by graphic art and typography and architecture. And so I was constantly cutting things and making blocks and making buildings out of shoeboxes.
As an adolescent I wrote comic books, because I read lots of them, and fantasy novels set in Malaysia and Central Africa.
When I was a kid, I could draw, and my ambition was to be a cartoonist. I wanted to draw comics. But I also liked newspaper comics.
I grew up in New York, and I've always been surrounded by fashion. My grandmother used to write for 'Vogue' in the '50s, and my mother was a dancer and a model.
I became a fashion designer by accident. I loved to make portrait drawings when I was a teenager, and from that came the interest in what people were wearing and why they were wearing it.
In college, I was a cartoonist at 'The Daily Northwestern.' So I draw myself. I was an animator. But basically, I went to Northwestern to major in English, wound up in college for two years. Studied animation there. Came to Disney. My first week at Disney was the week that 'Star Wars' came out.
I began modeling in N.Y. and doing commercials. That led to regional theatre and then Broadway and then movies.
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