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.

A singer can quit once he or she has made ten great songs; a director can finish once he or she has made five amazing films; a writer just needs to write three great books.

The nature of fashion is family. You see that at almost every house, it was owned first by a family. It wasn't owned by a bank.

It was not the story of design or clothes, it was the fantasy of women that made me want to work in fashion.

I've always said fashion is like roast chicken: You don't have to think about it to know it's delicious.

The whole season thing is nonsense. It's either beautiful or it isn't. That's something I really learned when I started collecting dresses.

Style is the only thing you can't buy. It's not in a shopping bag, a label, or a price tag. It's something reflected from our soul to the outside world. An emotion.