'Project Runway' winner Michelle Lesniak stays firmly planted in Portland (video) (2024)

Millions of TV viewers watched Portland native

of

in April. Her collection, created for and shown at New York's Fashion Week, won praise from the show's big-name judges, including star designers

and

Marie Claire magazine's

and supermodel

.

With all that publicity and attention from New York fashion folk, it wouldn't be surprising if the latest

winner decided to follow in the footsteps of prior Portland victors

and

and move to New York.

But as anybody who watched Season 11 learned, this is one winner who has her own ideas about what's best for her.

"I do not plan on leaving Portland," the 34-year-old says. "There are no rules, and if there is a rule that one has to live in New York City or Los Angeles, I plan on breaking that rule."

On a rainy Tuesday morning, she's hard at work in her Southeast Portland studio. Her compact space is one of many located in a converted industrial building that now houses workspaces for a variety of design, craft and other small businesses.

Life post-"Runway" presents both opportunities and challenges. There have been some changes in her life since filming the finale at Fashion Week in February.

For one thing, she and her husband are getting a divorce, which means she'll be going back to her family name, Lesniak.

"It's very amicable," she says. "We put in 10 years of marriage."

Her designs on "Project Runway" showed viewers that Lesniak has a very personal fashion aesthetic. In the Lifetime series' first "Teams" edition, Lesniak's work included a duct-tape prom dress, a chartreuse satin shift with chiffon and microsuede trim (a winning look that sold out at Lord & Taylor department store in New York), and a "bleeding heart" sweater -- a sweater adorned with an image of the internal organ with bright red droplets spilling from it.

Today, Lesniak, her hair cut stylishly short and noticeably slimmer than she was on "Project Runway," is dressed in jeans and a top of her own design, a dark pinstriped shirt with a fanciful bow. She jokingly compares her shirt to the power-suit blouses worn by cast members of the '80s sitcom

"I'm a Sugarbaker woman!" she says, exuberantly imitating the Southern accent of the show's stars, Dixie Carter and Delta Burke.

Her gift for playfully mimicking the "Project Runway" judges deciding her fate -- notably the imperious Garcia -- was just one of the reasons why Lesniak emerged as one of the most quick-witted, entertaining contestants in the show's history.

It comes as no surprise that Lesniak's studio is very much an expression of her passions and personal taste. Giving a tour -- which requires relatively little walking, as it's just one room -- Lesniak begins by stating the obvious:

"I really, really like deer."

Indeed, on shelves, walls and display boards, she's placed black-velvet paintings of deer, ceramic figurines of deer and sketches of deer. Above the door hangs a large, weathered deer head, which Lesniak dubbed "Sir Charles."

"He's seen better days," she says, noting that the trophy looks a little "mangy."

Though Lesniak's winning collection on "Project Runway" was inspired by her feeling like a lone wolf, who, as she said, had lost her pack and needed one last kill, she says, "I don't know if I could kill a deer, myself."

Her "Project Runway" victory was especially sweet, given that in the first several weeks of the season, she was on teams that consistently lost. She's still waiting, however, for delivery of her prizes, including $100,000, a 2013 Lexus GS 350 and a $50,000 technology suite by Hewlett-Packard and Intel.

"I'm still hustling," she says, to make money to pay her rent.

Thinking about how to make the most of her "Project Runway" exposure, Lesniak is pondering whether it's a good idea to relaunch her line, Au Clothing. But she rebranded with that name about a year ago, so she's wondering about the marketing and rebranding necessary to name the line after herself.

Despite her self-possessed manner on "Project Runway," Lesniak says she felt far less secure when filming began last summer.

"I'm totally self-taught," she says, and she was intimidated at first by competitors with more experience.

Lesniak took a long and winding road to the runway. The Cleveland High School graduate liked to make her own clothes growing up. She'd take vintage pieces and rework them to come up with something new.

"I designed my prom dress, and all my dance dresses. I wanted to look different and look like an individual."

Her mother sewed, and her grandmother was an award-winning quiltmaker. "My mom sewed my Rose Festival dress," Lesniak recalls, when she was member of the Cleveland High

Court in 1996.

But even then, she was making her own fashion statement:

"I walked onstage barefoot."

Early on, it was apparent that Lesniak wasn't cut out to take over the family business (her father runs a company that mixes specialty oils for clients).

Her creative urge inspired her to move to Chicago to attend the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. But she had to leave because she couldn't afford it. She began working in the food industry in Chicago and became more involved in the wine side of the business.

After moving back to Portland in 2001, Lesniak got jobs in the wine industry. But her creative side kept calling. She ultimately decided to quit her job in the wine business about two years ago.

She showcased as an emerging designer at what was then known as Portland Fashion Week (it's now called

) in 2010. And she applied for "Project Runway" in 2011 but didn't make it onto the show, though two other Portland designers, Bryce Black and Becky Ross, did.

"There's something in the water up there," "Project Runway" executive producer and showrunner Sara Rea told

as Season 11 was about to debut. The Portland area, she said, "has been a very fruitful area for us. There are definitely high-quality designers coming out of there."

Even though Lesniak had an up-and-down experience on "Project Runway" -- at one point, she was so

-- she says it was transformative.

"I went from thinking, 'I'm just a little girl from Portland,' to looking around the room, and realizing, 'Oh, I am good at this.'"

Surrounded by bolts of fabric, and some works in progress, Lesniak says she's now at the point "where I need to start hiring employees."

She'll show at the "Alley 33" show this summer and "FashioNXT" in October. And the local stores that carry her garments --

and

-- can't keep Lesniak's clothes on the shelves.

Bocci spotted Lesniak's talent from the beginning, she recalls.

"Her pieces now are all selling out. I get something in, and before I can email customers to say I got it in, it's pretty much gone."

Bocci carries designs by another area "Project Runway" winner, Vancouver resident

, who was on the initial judging panel that approved Lesniak for this season. Bocci thinks the key element for Lesniak is to make the most of the exposure she received on the show.

"She's got the drive, the passion and the personality to be in front of a camera, to do so much more than design," Bocci says.

The best advice "Project Runway" mentor

gives to winners, Bocci says, isn't to go bury themselves in producing a line. "What they should do is use the contacts that they made, whether it's with Zac Posen, or Heidi Klum, or Michael Kors, and build their connection base. They've got the rest of their lives to design, rather than hibernate and do a collection."

Lesniak says her post-"Runway" life has been busy with travel and appearances related to the show. She soon flies to Ohio to appear at the annual Duct Tape Festival. She flies to New York City and Chicago to participate in Intel-sponsored events.

Watching herself on the show as it aired on Lifetime, Lesniak was struck by how she came across. "Wow, I was confident and had a very strong sense of self."

Now, she says, she knows who she is, and loves who she is, "warts and all. I learned my strengths and weaknesses, and I know I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing."

-- Kristi Turnquist