I don't want to see a dress with a woman. I just want to see a woman, with a beautiful dress.

Almost every collection I do has 200 different references. I don't have two of the same coat, two of the same dress. I have it in one color, in one fabric. I've tried to adapt the culture of couture, and the know-how and the heritage, but I try to update it.

All I want is beautiful. I mean, I like grey hair, I love wrinkles. But this is me.

Yves Saint Laurent gave women power, Chanel liberated them and when I joined Lanvin, I thought 'what do I bring to women? One day, I received an SMS from a friend in New York - she was in a taxi on the way to court to face her arsehole ex-husband, and she said to me 'Alber, I am wearing a Lanvin dress, and I feel so protected.' That to me was the biggest compliment I ever received. To have a 500 gram piece of silk make her feel protected - that made me very happy indeed.

I know amazing people in fashion who are anything but fake. They are very real and very sensitive. They are happy and sad. They are loyal friends.

Women can dream at 9 in the morning and at 10 o'clock at night - it doesn't matter.

I am very sensitive to the smells and sensations that are part of perfumes because they remind me of things: moments from the past, people, events.