Tim Gunn Reveals Inspiration for Project Runway’s ‘Make it Work’ Catchphrase

Tim Gunn has revealed the true story behind his unforgettable Project Runway catchphrase “make it work.”

“I’ll tell you the catalyst for [‘make it work’],” Gunn, 71, told People in an interview published on February 20. “I was teaching a two-semester-long class – 30 weeks – with the same students in their senior year. They were developing their portfolios, which had to correspond to the collection they were creating in a different class. And I had a student, extremely talented, who in April – this was in September, and now it’s April – declared, ‘I’m going to start all over.’ [I said], ‘No, you’re not.’”

The Emmy Award winner, who confirmed that his motivational phrase was developed while he mentored fashion students at the Parsons School of Design, remembered using this experience with a discouraged student as a way to motivate his whole class to keep pursuing their dreams.

“[I told the student to] come up with a diagnosis of what’s troubling you, and then a prescription for how to ‘make it work’ — how to move forward with this,” he recalled. “I said to her and to the rest of the class, ‘If I just let you abandon something and move on to something else, maybe it will work, but maybe it won’t. But if you really sit down and critically analyze what’s happening – and as I said a moment ago, come up with a prescription for how to ‘make it work’ – you have just enhanced your whole internal toolbox, your problem-solving abilities.”

Gunn continued: “Life is filled with problems you’re going to need to solve. If you can figure out how to deal with that and how to make things work, it just makes you so much more agile and capable of really conquering the world.”

The saying has clearly resonated, as Gunn shared that he still hears it often, telling People, “[Someone said it to me] just about two hours ago!”

Gunn put his own advice to excellent use for 16 seasons inspiring and mentoring young designers on Project Runway, until he left the show alongside host Heidi Klum in 2018. The pair reunited for three seasons of design competition Making the Cut on Prime Video from 2020 to 2022.

Supermodel Karlie Kloss and designer Christian Siriano replaced the duo on Project Runway from season 17 onward, but Us Weekly confirmed in January that Klum was returning as Runway‘s host for its season 21 move to Freeform.

Earlier in February, Gunn told People that he “wasn’t asked back” as part of the Disney-owned Freeform’s revamp of the series.

“[The producers] went back to [my agent] and said, ‘Well, we’ve thought about it and we’d be willing to offer Tim a small cameo in one episode.’ What do I do? Wave from a bus? As the designers are going into Mood [Fabrics]?” he joked. “Heidi comes to see me at the retirement home and we play croquet?”

The long-time Project Runway mentor continued: “So no thank you. And as Heidi would say, you’re either in or you’re out. And I’m out. So I wasn’t asked to join.”

Gunn conceded that he was initially “devastated, then kind of humiliated” to be snubbed by the show, but later made peace with the closing of a chapter in his life.

“I thought, ‘How lucky am I to have had the experiences that I’ve had over the last 20 years? This is phenomenal,’” he said.

Project Runway returns for its 21st season on Freeform in 2025.