You need something that puts a little distance between what you really are and what you want to show; it's a shield, a protection.

I think Rihanna is very interesting. But those people, the singers especially, know how to handle themselves because they're in the limelight. That's why it has grown into something where the model has stepped back - and I don't know if it's coming forward again.

For me, I go somewhere for three days, and then I come back and I want to change everything, and so it's a fight with everybody. I'm transforming and convincing. It's more than designing. It's shaking people and trying to give them direction. I'm a bit of a control freak. This is a problem as I get older, and it's something I should work on. I should be more confident - learn to trust people and give them freedom and delegate.

It's quite strange in fashion, and it's probably the same with movies and acting - the big choice is between being radical, making a choice that will be more specific that will reach less people but will be very strong and very directional, and making a choice that will be more popular and catch the interest of a large group of people. Sometimes people are trying to push you in one direction or another.

In French we have this word déclic. It's when you have, suddenly, a light shining and you say, "This is what I want to do."

Designers are more like artistic directors now. Before, there wasn't this idea of supervising the artistic direction of the entire house. The old way was to think you could be this couturier or designer or stylist.

It's true that fashion is looking at fashion all the time, and this is quite boring.