I like to undress women - not to dress them. You know, like Manet's 'Olympia' or Helmut Newton's photographs - naked women with shoes. This is what I am trying to do.

Something I really hate more than anything else is clogs.

At age 12 or 13, I wanted to design for showgirls - for the theater!

People say I am the king of painful shoes. I don't want to create painful shoes, but it is not my job to create something comfortable. I try to make high heels as comfortable as they can be, but my priority is design, beauty and sexiness. I'm not against them, but comfort is not my focus.

I feel I am a role model to many, not just for my designs, but also for the fact that I started my own company with the help of my two friends. I became a success story, and people relate to that.

When I started to work on perfume, I could not reduce the idea of a woman to one smell.

There is a heel that is too high to walk in, certainly. But who cares? You don't have to walk in high heels.