Karim Rashid - Profiled For Wearing One Color

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Karim Rashid Industrial Designer. White half the time, pink half the time.

Why white? In college, I was obsessed with wearing all white. I felt angelic and free. But then, in the early eighties, I started wearing black. That was status quo in the avant-garde. If you were interesting—a designer, an architect—you wore all black.
How long did that last? I went to Rome to do my master’s in ’82. I wore all black, with pink hair. But that was considered Fascist. I had to tone down my dress.
Why didn’t you return to black back in New York? Every profession has dress codes. In 2000, I was on a panel with nine architects, and I wore a white suit. Everyone was wearing black except me. I felt detached from the incestuous profession.
Now you also wear pink. Why? Sometimes I think it’s because my mother dressed me in pink when I was a child. She wanted me to be a girl.
How do people react to a grown man in pink?I make them smile. They say, “You make me happy.”