Jen Lancaster Quotes

My dad used to give me old electrical equipment that didn't work anymore, and I'd put things together. I think that's why I like to mix things that don't belong.

I credit my mom with inspiring in me a love of design, matched by her creative problem-solving abilities. This is a woman who could find an old, discarded piece of furniture, bring it home and turn it into something fabulous.

I see potential in everything. It's about opening your mind to what you can do to the garment: because they're cheap, you can cut them or stitch them, and if you stuff it up, it's fine - it's only two dollars.

You can do great things with low-tech stuff.

I'm very crafty! One time I made a television set out of a cardboard box - Everybody thought it was a lark! This was the beginning of a love affair with the arts.

I think everyone now rotates. The Tinkerman was one; now there are a lot of tinkermen!

As humans, we've always innovated our way out of problems, whether it was the first torch to light a dark cave or the steam engine that sparked a revolution.

I was always taking garbage from around the house and making my own toys. I wasn't given a Wii or an Xbox or anything.

I'd take garbage, and I'd glue them together and create inventions.

I just like building stuff.

I love Sugru like I love duct tape. I basically just compensated for lack of building skills with Sugru.

I feel like fashion is about being innovative and being able to turn something into something else, making it cool, and making it your own.

I became interested in building furniture, because I couldn't find pieces I really loved for myself and my clients. I picked stuff up from the street, and tweaked those pieces to make them what I really wanted. It became a career!

I always knew I wanted to create. I used to sit in my room for hours drawing and making things. I once got into trouble for cutting up my mother's lampshades to make a dress. I was three.

They say that structure is freedom, and in a sense it is. When you're dealing with multiple constraints, you have to figure out what you can get out of that.

Life is composed of different inventions. I have continued to work at different things and rebuilt my home all by myself. I did it for the sake of satisfaction at doing something.

If you've done a brilliant version it becomes something else.

As our case is new, we must think and act anew.

You know how people love to glamorize poverty? There's nothing glamorous about it. But it did make me really creative. Those days, I was literally taking t-shirts in the day and sewing them back together to make dresses for the night.

Coming up with a way to fix mistakes challenges your creativity and your critical thinking skills and your resourcefulness. Often you end up with something better than what you planned on in the first place.

I did not know how to paint a mural. I did not know how to prepare the surface. There was nobody from the Renaissance around who could advise me, and I did the best I could.

And in order to succeed in later life, you need creative skills because look at how fast the world is changing.

Out of economic hardship can come change - we are suddenly cast onto our wits and our talents and our resources and our strengths, as we lose all the choices we once had.

I just find things that work and embellish them.

As a species, we tend to be doers, forever shaping and reshaping the world to better suit our purposes.