After decades in fashion, Isaac Mizrahi has designs on a second-act in show business

Isaac Mizrahi is not your typical fashion designer. You may know him from Project Runway, Sex and the City or even shopping for ties with Conan O'Brien, but for someone who was once called "the bad boy of fashion" Mizrahi's story is very accessible.

The designer struggled with weight and body image for much of his life, but found he could express his feelings through fashion. "I repressed some emotions and I replaced them with artifice," Mizrahi told q's Tom Power. "I think that's a big part of what design really is. It's taking something that should be ordinary or mundane — or something real — and dressing it up."

Mizrahi joined us to share how he came to embrace fashion design, which he also writes about in his newly released memoir.

Click 'listen' near the top of this page to hear the full interview.

— Produced by Vanessa Greco