You know how comic strips have lines coming from characters’ mouths so you know they’re speaking? If Isaac Mizrahi were a cartoon character, those lines would have to be swirls — long, luxurious ones that depict enthusiastic phrases, gently swooping trains of thoughts and an amazing ability to conjure images with just words and his always moving hands.

Like fashion itself, the career of the colorfully iconic designer, TV personality and current Liz Claiborne creative director has been a work of constant reinvention.

Since his 1987 debut, he’s created not only his own couture line but designed for everything from Broadway (the revival of The Women) to his landmark “Isaac Mizrahi for Target” line. His five years at Target brought high fashion to big-box stores and helped make him a mainstream household name.

Recently, Mizrahi and Fashion Week creator Fern Mallis had tea and a fashion talk with some of Palm Beach’s loveliest ladies at the gorgeous new Omphoy Ocean Resort. Before the talk, Mizrahi chatted briefly with us about Palm Beach style, parkas, and the connection between Archie Bunker and the ever-changing nature of fashion.

Question: Palm Beach has its own distinct style. What do you think of it?

Answer: It’s very quintessentially American. It’s not trendy. … And it’s not just preppy or WASPy or whatever people want to call it. It’s just basically American, mixing things up in an interesting way.

Q: It’s seen a lot in Lilly Pulitzer, which people love, eternally.

A: Yes, we do! It’s the greatest thing in the world. And it’s not just pastels — there was a woman I saw earlier who was wearing this tunic with beads, that was very easy. Lilly — it’s the greatest. Her pieces are like neutrals. And (that look) works everywhere, it really does. If you were in Europe, for instance, that look would be really representative of who we are. American fashion is a universal thing.

Q: What, to you, is the big story in fashion for 2010?

A: Less and less, I care about fashion. I care more about my own little world. (Laughs) I keep thinking about Fred Astaire, about the movies in the ’50s. (His show at Bryant Park for Fashion Week was titled “Astaire Case or Obstacle Course.”) The most interesting thing about clothing is the structure. In the ’50s, in the movies, there was a terrific sense of color that was not garish. It’s wonderful to know how to put together color in an interesting, heartbreaking way.

Q: How do you get people to continue to be interested in fashion during an economic recession?

A: I don’t value things because they’re expensive, or think that something is good just because it’s expensive. You know, I don’t know much about wine, but there are times when I need wine, and if it’s expensive, I feel comfortable about buying.

Q: I read an interview where you said that one of the things you’d learned from designing for Target was that you now knew what a ‘Large’ really was, as opposed to what it is in couture.

A: (Laughs) One thing about doing Target is that I had everybody, like the (socialite) Miller sisters, going “I love it! I can go to Target and buy 10 of those!” And I was like “Darling, that’s wonderful, but I didn’t necessarily create those for you.” There’s an aspirational quality to (the Target line), when a person aspires to buy something. I must say it’s very fun. I believe that fashion should be something proactive. (Coming into) Liz Claiborne, needing to trend into a certain thing is annoying, to have someone say “It has to be the blah blah blah.” It’s very important to create a business from your own loins. (Cracks up) It’s difficult to create from someone else’s loins.

Q: I imagine that it would be. Changing the subject a little — one of my favorite scenes from Bravo’s The Fashion Show, which you hosted, was when designer Johnny was pouting about not doing well at a challenge, and his excuse was that he didn’t design for middle America, which didn’t get him. And you kinda freaked out on him.

A: Well, it’s a cop-out! I grew up in the ’80s — I was 20 in 1987 — and Grace Mirabella was the editor of Vogue at the time. She was a real thinker, that one. Then Anna (Wintour) came in. She loves the pop! She’s very visual. But when I think about (fashion), I think about a 35-year-old, who knows who she is. I’m not dressing a kid. She has a brain in her head. That’s what’s sexy. That scene that’s in Miami? There’s nothing sexy about that. It’s obvious, vapid. I like nutty, arty people who are real now, you know, “sexy” in air quotes. And it’s too late, once it becomes fashion.

Q: What’s funny is that some people think that air quotes and that aesthetic are synonymous with fashion.

A: I know. By the time something gets out I’m almost over it. In my first collection, I had these plaid parkas, and by the next season I was bored. Ellen Saltzman, the fashion director at Saks, called me and said “Darling, where are the parkas?”

Q: What would you like to be remembered for? Like a specific piece, or maybe an idea of a philosophy?

A: OK. An idea. It’s somehow proving that fashion is not just a business. It’s a culture. Sometimes in culture, when something happens, it doesn’t last. The minute you see it is the minute it’s over. I loved All in the Family when I was a kid, but then when everyone discovered it I didn’t anymore. The minute something becomes a commodity I get very nervous.