For Isabel Toledo, one creative concept emerges from another, and different ones naturallyintersect. She believes that no one can invent something special every day, and that patience, persistence and passion are the keys to creation.

Folds are at the heart of Isabel's investigation into the traditional Japanese art of origami, in which a flat square of paper is folded to create a three-dimensional animal, bird or flower. Origami has obvious parallels to clothing construction, whether the garment is created from flat paper patterns or by directly draping the cloth. By changing the usual location of the fold of a coat facing, moving it from the vertical front opening to the horizontal edge of the collar, Isabel is able to line the front opening with a different fabric and gain graphic contrast. Visual effects are obtained from the fundamental structure of the garment, rather than from ornament or trimming. The end product has the inevitability and complexity of an organic form.

Varying the folds of the same basic shape, Isabel created a series of jellyfish blouses. The exploration and development of a shape to its fullest potential is a characteristic of Toledo's work. She believes in the incubation of ideas to full term, refusing to launch designs that suggest questions but do not deliver viable answers. Her care and thought for every piece is seen in the zigzag dress, in which a single piece of fluid georgette is folded and suspended in a continuous wave-like pattern. As folds progressively cover one another, transparency evolves to opacity. Diagonal outlines suggest motion and the dress actually allows it. Charmed by such pieces, and by Toledo's unique take on Cuban culture, the choreographer Twyla Tharp asked her to design garments for the contemporary Cuban dance piece Yemawa Yenaya.