You never do things thinking you will make a big statement. It just happens sometimes and you are lucky.

I love this idea of being able to touch people with something quite familiar, something quite emotional, and at the same time, have the feeling that this is a new way of doing it, a fresh way of showing things. I like radical people. At the same time, I'm fascinated by popularity, people who were able to have huge success and also keep their consistency.

When my parents realized that what I liked was fashion, they gave me good advice. I remember my father telling me that I should try to do an internship. They never said, "This is a world we don't know; it might be something strange," or "That is not serious," or things like that. They always said, "Try. We'll help you. We'll send drawings to people if you want. We'll write letters for you." What I'm very thankful for is they never made me think that something was impossible. They were really, really supportive. They are still.

I've always been fascinated by people's capacity to care. Everyone has a different capacity for it. Some people can take on more and deal with more. Today, with the economy, I have such respect for the hard work that has to be done. But we're on this planet and we have a responsibility to ourselves to care.

Never forget that what becomes timeless was once truly new.

I don't feel French at all. That was never really a concern, and it's limiting to think that way. I think Paris is more of a playground for international designers, so I don't really feel French. And I don't really want to feel French.

Naturally looking at something will become so important in your aesthetic. For that, you have to be disciplined, too, in the way that there is a moment to catch and there is a moment to express. The moment to express has to be so pragmatic, because you have to build the clothes; you have to be very, very specific about how you want to describe to other people, for the color of the fabric, the way of sewing things, putting things together.