Mirror, Mirror: She'll send her designs down TV's 'Runway'

EW: How would you describe your Runway experience overall? What will it add to your future? Has your design aesthetic been reshaped at all by the show?

KHS: Project Runway was definitely a great experience, even with all the craziness. It's a whole different world that I wasn't accustomed to, just being there. The show didn't shape my design aesthetic. If people don't have their own point of view when they get there, the show will eat them up. I did learn about the different processes and technical aspects. I didn't go to school for that.

EW: Your look you designed in the first show was great. You did a lot in five hours. How did you pull it off?

KHS: First of all, we only got about 3½ hours. They say five hours, but it really was less. The whole time I was hovering over myself, thinking, 'How am I here? How can I put this together in this amount of time?' We spent a lot of time just getting acclimated. The fabric I picked was so thick. ... It was absolute madness, nerve-wracking. It was the hardest challenge we had.

Contact fashion writer Elizabeth Wellington at 215-854-2704 or ewellington@phillynews.com. Follow her on Twitter at ewellingtonphl.