I Totally Won

This has been the highlight for me since I’ve been here … me and Merlin won the Mini Challenge so we won five minutes of personal consultation time with Isaac Mizrahi. My heart was pounding with nerves and excitement. Just being able to have one-on-one time with someone you have admired and highly respect is very overwhelming. His collection was stunning. All the mixing of fabrication and texture, I was trying to take it all in. Leaving Issac’s I had a really strong idea of the direction I wanted to go in. I was nervous working with Merlin just because he is very flashy with his work. But, he was very open to my ideas and let me have full reign with this challenge. I was worried because although we are a team we are being judged individually and the complete look was in the design, fabric selection, all the details, and trims, so if they hated it I was fully responsible and he’d (Merlin) would surely let the judge know. But in the end the judges loved it all, not one negative comment — well the fabric choice for the jacket — but Veronica Webb said she would totally wear it so to me I totally won and I know I wouldn’t have been able to have done this complete look without Merlin. He really was exceptional.