They were enormously chic. My father was very chic. My mother was a heavy woman and she wore wonderful, bright colors, and pajamas, but when she was in town or in New York City or in Paris, she would wear navy blue or black. But there was a flamboyance to both of them.

I do think there is a lack of modernity at the moment - and I don't even like that word, modernity, anymore. There aren't enough designers today anyway - there are more stylists.

When you think about Balenciaga muse and model Charlotte Gainsbourg and Lou Doillon - I mean, you look at their mother Jane Birkin, and what they have grown up to be . . . They aren't invaded in fashion, and yet they love it.I mean, who is going to schlep these big skirts and trains and all these things? How wonderful it is to see the young in miniskirts!

I remember once I didn't like a dress that we had to shoot - I'll never forget this - and so I turned it inside out and put it on the model backward.

I think there a lot of great photographers working right now in the 2010. At the same time I do occasionally feel a great disappointment in some of the things that I see from certain people. But it is today.

That bothers me when I see that fashion editors are consultants for brands. It tells me that the designer has lost sight of what he or she really wants to do, and that he or she is listening to the strength of a very strong stylist and being a little watered down - and by watered down, I mean, the strength of the designer's vision. I'm not saying it's easy.

Helmut Lang is an amazing man - always striving, always moving forward.