The phrase “like mother like daughter” holds especially true in the Knowles family. Blessed with great genes, matriarch Tina Knowles has passed her beauty, brains, and flair for fashion on to her two famous daughters, Beyoncé and Solange.

Besides being a devoted mother, Tina is a true renaissance woman who can and has done it all. She’s been a hairstylist, a make-up artist, and even an author, penning “Destiny’s Style.” Inspired by her own mother, Tina is also a talented designer. In 2004 she and Beyoncé started a collection of hip-haute couture called House of Deréon which has since been expanded to include two more lines, Deréon and Miss Tina, the name her staff respectfully and affectionately calls her.

Using her innovative and artistic talents, Tina is about to launch a new line of home décor as well. In addition to overseeing a fashion empire, this amazing woman can whip up a mean pot of Creole gumbo and help the homeless and disadvantaged without breaking a sweat.

This Up Close and Personal will leave you feeling energized. Beyoncé and Solange are two lucky girls. Miss Tina Knowles is one superstar mama.

Marsala Rypka: Describe yourself in three words.

Tina Knowles: Family-oriented, optimistic and creative.

MR: What are you most passionate about?

TK: My two girls, Beyoncé and Solange, have been the biggest and best thing I’ve ever done in my whole life. I’m also very involved with my church, St. John’s United Methodist Church in downtown Houston. Our family started the Survivor Foundation through which we contribute money to Bread of Life, a non-profit arm of St. John’s that ministers to the homeless and people displaced by domestic abuse. I’m really proud of the Knowles-Rowland Center for Youth where kids can get support and counseling without any questions as long as they’re attending school. There’s a basketball court and all kinds of things for them to do there.

My family donated half the money, along with the city of Houston, to build the Knowles Temenos Place Apartments, which opened in December 2009. It has 45 units that people can rent for a small amount of money for up to a year as long as they are working or receiving some kind of job training. Normally when people are displaced and homeless because of mental illness, domestic abuse or drug abuse, it’s difficult for them to get back on their feet because they can’t afford to pay for a place to live, a phone, and utilities. We have a small business center there and vans that provide transportation. The whole idea is to get them back to being productive citizens. I’m really proud and excited about it. Growing up my family didn’t have a lot of money so it’s important for me to reach out to people who are struggling.

MR: What kind of childhood did you have?

TK: My parents were both Creole from Louisiana. My mother was the youngest of 15 kids. From an early age she was always looking at fashion magazines and could knock off anything she saw. She would create patterns out of newspapers and make the most beautiful dresses and evening clothes. Growing up, we were so poor I wondered how my parents could afford the tuition to send us to Catholic school. It wasn’t until I was an adult that I found out my mom had bartered her services. She made the altar clothes, the nuns’ habits, and school uniforms while my dad drove the nuns around in exchange for us going to private school. I was glad to find that out because as a kid I was resentful, wondering why they did all that stuff for them.

Looking for a better life, my parents moved to Galveston, Texas where my Dad got a job on the waterfront as a longshoreman. When I was in high school, I made all of my clothes and my friends’ prom dresses. My mom taught me that if you buy the remnants of beautiful fabrics, which are the last few yards at the end of the bolt, they are a fraction of their original cost. Like Beyoncé, I was also in a singing group as a kid, and my mom and I made all of those costumes as well. Everything I did prepared me for what I ended up doing with Destiny’s Child, which was really a blessing.

MR: Name three people who have had a great influence on your life?

TK: It might sound weird because I’m older than them, but Beyoncé and Solange influence me all the time. They are my biggest cheerleaders. If I think I can’t do something, I talk to my kids and I leave thinking I can.

Second is my nephew, Johnny Rittenhouse, who was two years older than me. He has since passed away, but he was my best friend and I was his muse. We both had our little sewing machines and we made clothes together all the time. If he had been born at another time and place he would have been a huge designer. I dedicated my book “Destiny’s Style” to him and my mother, Agnes Deréon Beyoncé.

Third would probably be my minister, Juanita Rasmus, who I’ve known for 25 years. She was a customer in my hair salon. She always had a positive message. She would tell me I could do anything. She motivated me to expand my salon and to start working with the girls.

MR: How did that evolution happen?

TK: I’ve done a lot of things. I was an exercise instructor, a make-up rep for Shiseido, a hair-stylist. I owned one of the largest hair salons in Texas. Once Destiny’s Child got going I was terrified and wanted to protect them because they were only 15 and 16 years old so I started traveling with them doing their hair and packing their clothes. They were frustrated because the stylists would always bring them black clothes which were too mature for them. They didn’t try to establish any kind of unique look for the group. We grew up watching Motown groups like The Supremes who had a signature look, something that set them apart. You couldn’t wait to see what they had on and no matter how outrageous it was, you loved it. I wanted to do the same thing for Destiny’s Child, but that wasn’t the image the record label had in mind. They had a tiny budget and they wanted the girls in jeans and t-shirts. It was never my intention to design for them. It started when they went to Cancun with Wyclef John (the Haitian-American rapper who was with the Fugees). The clothes the record label sent got lost and we had to create something for them to wear. I went to the Army Surplus store and got real camouflage outfits and converted them into sexy costumes. Wyclef John asked, ‘Who styled you?’ and Beyoncé said, ‘My mom.’ He said, ‘She needs to style you all the time.’ That’s how it started. Destiny’s Child started the whole camouflage craze during their “Survivor” album. As things progressed I did what my mom taught me. I bought beautiful fabrics and made outfits rather than buying cheaper clothes.

MR: You went way beyond the call of duty. I heard that one time the girls wanted highlights in their hair, but there wasn’t enough time (this was before hair extensions were popular) so you snipped a few highlighted strands from your own hair and clipped them on them.

TK: We had so many situations like that where we had to improvise.

MR: What is your greatest strength and your greatest weakness?

TK: My greatest strength is my tenacity. I will go the extra mile and never give up. My weakness is probably biting off more than I can chew. I take on way too much stuff. Lord, I need to learn how to say no. I always say ‘I can do it,’ and I do, but it kills me. For example, I made 50 red bodysuits for all the dancers for the last MTV Awards in New York. Two days before the awards my daughter said she didn’t think the color was showing up well, so the day before the show we made 50 new bodysuits. The only fabric we could find was white and we had to dye them all silver grey. We were up for 24 hours. My girls are spoiled. They think ‘Mom can do it,’ because I’ve always done it. But people don’t normally do this. My kids think of me as Superwoman, but the truth is I’m human.

MR: What would people be surprised to learn about you?

TK: That I’m a funny storyteller. I’m always coming into the office with some crazy stories and acting them out.

MR: Please tell one.

TK: This past Christmas I wanted to get my five-year-old grandson a pug puppy, so at the last minute on Christmas Eve I called a listing in the newspaper. This guy answered the phone and I asked about the puppies and he said, ‘My Paw-Paw is roping a cow and my Maw-Maw is in the hospital and I don’t know anything about it.’ It sounded like this guy was from way out in the country so I hung up. Around 8 p.m. I got desperate and I called back. By then his Paw-Paw was back from roping a cow and I spoke to him. He said ‘You’ll have to come out here and look at ‘em.’ I’m thinking what if I go out there and they put me in a wood chipper and no one ever hears from me again! It turns out they were on a farm an hour-and-a-half outside of Houston so I talked him into meeting me halfway. I brought my niece with me who is about 4’11” and we went to meet two men in a parking lot at a PETCO in the middle of nowhere on Christmas Eve. A truck pulls up with a rifle in the back and I’m thinking maybe they’ll take us hostage, bring us back to the farm and kill us. But I really wanted that puppy for my grandson. Anyway, the man turns out to be the sweetest Paw-Paw. His name is Buddy and we named the puppy after him. It was a good lesson that you can’t judge somebody by the way they talk.

MR: What is your most treasured material possession?

TK: Family photos because I’ve lost so many of them. All the photo albums I had with pictures from my childhood with my parents and my six sisters and brothers and my kids growing up were packed in boxes in the utility room, and when we moved to the new house the movers didn’t bring them over. They put a lot of stuff in the attic so it was six months before I discovered they were missing and by then it was too late. It was painful to lose those precious photos because they can never be replaced. I asked family members for photos but there weren’t too many. For Christmas I made photo albums for my kids, but they were pitiful. I asked a friend to make copies of the pictures and organize them carefully and she said I was acting like the photos were gold, which they are.

MR: Who would you trade places with for 24 hours?

TK: Nostradamus. I’ve always been curious how those predictions came to him. I know it was from a higher place, but did he hear a voice from God?

MR: What is your greatest extravagance?

TK: Food, culture and people from around the world fascinate me, so I’d say travel. That’s the one thing I’ve always spent money on since I was very young. I shouldn’t say very young because I didn’t leave Texas till I was out of high school. Then I moved to California, Denver and Atlanta. My cousin was one of the first black flight attendants for Delta and that’s what I wanted to be. The first time I went to Europe I was 27, right after I had Beyoncé. My husband worked for Xerox and he always won these trips for being top salesman, so we went to places like London, Paris, and Rome. If they were taking us to Egypt, we would go to Turkey and Greece on our own. We didn’t have a lot of money, but that was something I was willing to splurge on. All of their lives I told Beyoncé and Solange about how I went to these Egyptian ruins where they played this thundering music and how I had chills and cried. It was such a spiritual experience that grown men were crying. Recently Beyoncé went to Egypt for a concert. I was glad she got to go, but I was sad that I couldn’t go with her because I had to do my show on the Home Shopping Network. Afterwards she said, ‘Mom, I know what you were talking about because I felt the same way. I started crying out there amidst the pyramids with the sun setting, thinking about what happened there so long ago.’

From Egypt she went to Greece and I got to join her there. We stayed at the Mystique Hotel in Santorini, which is up in the mountains overlooking the water. It was breathtaking. We did a fashion photo shoot there for our new spring line and in one of the pictures Beyoncé is leaping off this white cliff that looks like a sculpture. I feel blessed that I got to experience the world as a young woman so when I go places with my daughters I can say, ‘I’ve already been here. I didn’t just go with you guys.’

MR: What makes you angry?

TK: People who complain about everything and constantly see things in a negative light get on my nerves. It’s irritating to the point that I have to say something to them.

MR: What five people would you invite to a dinner party?

TK: I’d like to see John and Jackie Kennedy interact with Michelle and President Obama. The Kennedys were young, gorgeous and cool with young children in the White House like the Obamas are today. I think John Kennedy would be pleased at the strides that have been made racially and that President Obama represents hope and optimism for the future.

I’d like to talk with Nelson Mandela about the strength of the human spirit and the lack of bitterness that he mastered. Harriet Tubman, the African-American abolitionist who used the Underground Railroad to rescue hundreds of slaves, because of her fearless courage and her willingness to die for freedom. And King David, my favorite person from the Bible, because he had such unwavering faith no matter what the circumstances.

MR: You said in your book that Marvin Gaye’s 1971 album “What’s Going On” was the soundtrack of your life during a time of political change in the country and personal change in the way you saw yourself as a woman and a person of color. Could you elaborate on that?

TK: It is one of my favorite albums of all time because in the songs he talks about social changes, the Vietnam War, and the environment being torn apart. He talks about God and spirituality. It’s a masterpiece. For the first time, young people started becoming more aware of things that were going on in the world and how they could make a difference rather than just being concerned with looking good and partying. It was a time of sit-ins and racial change. Things were desegregated but they really weren’t. It was such a conscious record. I spent so many hours listening to it. It was like a coming-of-age for me. I still listen to it. There’s one song that’s so honest where he talks about being in so much pain from the drugs. The Vietnam War affected so many people who came back shell-shocked. Their lives were a mess and people didn’t want to talk about it. We still don’t like to talk about it.

MR: Who influenced you fashion-wise?

TK: Bob Mackie was one. I loved watching “Dallas”, and I loved the stage clothes he designed for Cher. I know it’s not a person, but Vogue magazine had a huge influence on me. Starting at the age of 14, I saved my money and couldn’t wait for the next issue to come out. I’d try to copy the hair, make-up and clothes. It was another world than the one I lived in, a fabulous world that I’d never imagined. Everything I sketched had this endless fishtail bottom because that’s what the women were wearing in Vogue.

MR: In 2004 you and Beyoncé launched the House of Deréon. You now have two other fashion lines, Deréon and Miss Tina. How do they differ?

TK: House of Deréon is a line of beautiful cocktail and evening dresses, sizes 2 to 14, inspired by Beyoncé’s red carpet looks. A lot of times she’ll go through magazines and tear out photos and show them to us. We don’t ever copy them, but it gives us an idea of the colors and textures she likes and then we’ll start sketching and designing. Fabrics inspire me. I can spend an entire day in a fabric store. The dresses are available at Neiman Marcus, Saks, Nordstrom and Bloomingdales.

Deréon focuses on Beyoncé’s fan base and includes children, pre-teens, juniors and a plus-size collection called Curvelicious. Deréon also has an extensive denim line which includes the Superlicious Skinny Jeans as well as handbags, shoes, jewelry, and lingerie. Deréon can be found at all Federated stores like Macy’s and Dillard’s and some specialty shops. We’re also about to launch a Home collection.

Miss Tina was born out of my frustration with finding clothes that fit and were age appropriate, but didn’t look frumpy. Miss Tina clothes are tailored, fashionable and affordable. Currently Miss Tina is sold exclusively through HSN; however we are exploring retail opportunities and hope to make an announcement soon.

MR: What three items should a woman have in her closet?

TK: A pair of sexy shoes. For me a killer heel is three-and-a-half inches, for my daughter it’s six inches. Also a beautiful jacket that fits well and a great pair of jeans. The Miss Tina jeans fit unbelievably well. The detail is amazing. They’re cut a little higher in the back, but are still a low rise in the front. They have darts in them so there’s no gap and they give you a lift and a butt even if you don’t have one. People rave about them no matter what their body type.

MR: You are very close to both of your daughters. How do Beyoncé and Solange’s personalities differ?

TK: Both Beyoncé and Solange knew what they liked and didn’t like early in life. I’m a little envious of people who know what they want to do at seven years old. Beyoncé is more like me. She’s the most analytical person I’ve ever seen. She analyzes everything. She thinks before she speaks so she can make sure it’s what she’s really feeling and that it’s logical and makes sense. I ponder over things, while Solange is more spontaneous. Whatever she’s feeling, she’ll go with. If you like it, you like it; if you don’t, too bad. She recently cut her hair really short, which I love, but it was no big deal to her. She was like, ‘I don’t feel like being bothered with hair right now so I’m going to cut it short and rock it and be fabulous with it.’ She’s the most confident person I’ve ever met. She bases her decisions on what she wants to do, not on what anyone else wants her to do, even me. She’s very grounded. Her son is who I got the puppy for at Christmas. I admire her strength. She was my inspiration for something I went through and she was like, ‘Mom, I was your inspiration?’

MR: Both of your daughters have unusual names. Where did they come from?

TK: Growing up I hated my name which was Celestine Beyoncé. I wanted my name to be Judy Smith. I changed my name to Tina Beyoncé and when I moved to California everyone said Beyoncé was such an exotic name. I started liking it and I decided if I had a daughter that’s what I would name her so we could keep the family name. Now I love it. When I was pregnant the second time I wanted to come up with another French name and when I was in Paris I picked up a baby name book. I found Solange and it sounded so musical, which is interesting because she’s also a singer and quite a songwriter. She’s written a lot of songs for Beyoncé and Kelly Rowland and Michelle Williams, the other girls from Destiny’s Child. Solange’s sophomore record came out last year and it received a lot of critical acclaim. She’s deejaying in Europe now and she’s amazing at it. She includes her own music in her repertoire and she performs. She walks to the beat of her own drum, trust me. I’m proud of both of my girls.

MR: Any words of wisdom?

TK: Don’t let a man make you feel bad about your body. If he loves you the way you are, then he’s a keeper. If he lowers your self-esteem, find someone else.

Exercise for health purposes and don’t obsess about every pound. Accentuate the positives and don’t fret over not being a size 6.

Don’t buy clothes that are too tight, too short, too young, or too sheer that they make you feel self-conscious.

Everyone is given different gifts. Don’t focus on someone else’s. Find your natural talents and use them well. There will always be people who don’t like you or who will try to take the wind out of your sails when good things happen to you. If you love yourself they won’t matter. Solange wrote a song called “This Song’s For You” after someone told her she wasn’t going to do well because she was Beyoncé little sister. The lyrics contain her personal mantra: ‘Say to yourself, I rock. I’m hot. I’m not gonna stop. Now go.’ The great thing about affirmations is that you can repeat them to yourself whenever you’re feeling blue. They can really work to lift you out of a funky mood.