Isaac Mizrahi speaks to a room of more than 730 Jewish women at JUF’s Women’s Division 2016 Spring Event on May 4. (Photo by Robert F. Kusel) See more photos from the event.

Isaac Mizrahi has dressed women his whole life — super famous women like Audrey Hepburn, Meryl Streep, Oprah Winfrey, and Michelle Obama. And, he says he’s a big fan of all women — including women of the tribe.

“You know how comfortable I am around Jewish women,” the Jewish trailblazing fashion mogul told more than 730 Jewish women at the Jewish United Fund of Metropolitan Chicago’s Women’s Division 2016 Spring Event on Wednesday afternoon, held at the Fairmont Chicago.

“Isaac Mizrahi: An Unruly History,” an exhibition of his clothes, drawings, hats, jewelry, shoes, and other accessories, is on display now through Aug. 7 at the Jewish Museum in New York City. “People ask me why the Jewish Museum? I think it’s an important time right now for Jews to come up and [speak out] considering the world situation,” Mizrahi said.

Hineni — here I am.

Before his remarks, women at the luncheon learned about the vital work and impact of JUF and supported the 2016 Annual Campaign.

“Every hour, every day, the women in this room are the wind beneath the wings of Jewish life and Jewish lives in Chicago, in Israel, and in 70 countries across the globe,” said Rachel Stein, vice president of Campaign for JUF’s Young Women’s Board.

This year marks the 70th anniversary of the founding of the National Women’s Division of what was then known as UJA (the United Jewish Appeal). In 1946, in the aftermath of the Holocaust, some 300 woman convened in St. Louis to show solidarity with the remnants of European Jewry and participate in a personal way in the relief effort.

Women then and now are the primary communicators and conveyors of Jewish history and heritage, traditions, and teachings, said Ann-Louise Kleper, longtime Chicago Jewish community leader, attorney, and a Chicago recipient of the North American Kipnis Wilson-Friedland award, named for the two women who founded the Lion of Judah. She explained that the reasons for women’s giving are even more compelling today. “When a woman makes a Campaign gift in her own name, she is demonstrating that she wants to be recognized as a full-fledged member of the community. She is saying hineni — here I am. I count and I can be counted upon,” Kleper said.

Other speakers included Cindy Kaplan, 2016 Women’s Board Vice-President of Campaign; Wendy Abrams, Women’s Board President; Kim Shwachman, Spring Event Chair; and Heather Sher, Young Women’s Board Spring Event Chair, who interviewed Mizrahi during the luncheon.

Isaac unzipped

Mizrahi was born and raised in an observant Sephardic Jewish Brooklyn community — his mother was a homemaker while his father made his living in the clothing business. Recognizing his son’s shared interest in fashion, Mizrahi’s father gave him a sewing machine when he was 10. Bullied for being overweight and effeminate while attending yeshiva in Flatbush, he convinced his parents to send him to high school for the performing arts and then the Parsons School of Design to pursue his twin loves of acting and design.

Mizrahi has been a trailblazer in the fashion industry for nearly 30 years. “I bore very easily and, as a fashion designer, that’s great because you keep creating this new look,” he said. “I procrastinate a lot and watch loads of TV…and then a creative idea hits me in the face like a gnat until I acknowledge it,” he said.

He was the subject and co-creator of Unzipped, a documentary film about the making of his fall 1994 ready-to-wear collection. He formed an partnership with Target in 2002 that helped create the concept of masstige, a term meaning “prestige for the masses.” In 2012, he launched the Isaac Mizrahi New York collection, and he’s Chief Designer for the Isaac Mizrahi brands, a division of Xcel Brands, Inc. He has hosted his own TV show, written two books, and appeared in film and television. He currently serves as a weekly judge on Project Runway: All-Stars.

One of his greatest loves is the stage, both as a performer and as a costume designer, He has designed costumes for the New York Metropolitan Opera, the American Ballet Theater, Broadway, and Off Broadway among others. “Under the stage lights,” he said, “things magically become beautiful.”

Mizrahi says he never wants to look back and wonder what could have been. “If there’s an idea, whether it’s creative, political, or philanthropic, it’s easier to do it than to wonder and regret not having done something,” said Mizrahi, who praised JUF’s mission.

Skepticism, he says, leads to creativity, and adds that Jews are a skeptical and questioning people. He describes his sense of skepticism in a story about his spouse buying him a gardenia. When he brought him the plant, “The first thing I said was, ‘That’s so beautiful. Thank you so much darling,’ immediately followed by ‘It’s going to die.’ Then my mother came over to [my house] and said, ‘How beautiful! It’s going to die.'”

“Knowing the gardenia plant is going to die is very good information,” Mizrahi told the women. “It doesn’t last forever. The important message about creativity is that it doesn’t last very long — and life doesn’t last very long. [So,] you really must grasp opportunities.”