What I want to express is a feeling-various emotions that I am experiencing at the time-whether it is anger or hope or anything else, and from different angles. I construct a collection and it takes concrete form. That's probably what appears conceptual to people because it never starts out with any specific historical or geographical reference. My point of departure is always abstract and multileveled.

Every time before a collection, I say, "I don't want it to come out. I want to cancel it. It's not good. I haven't achieved anything."

Most of the things I read from journalists are, you know, a little bit simplified and easy.

It would have more meaning for me to hear what critics have to say if their values and their ways of living were deeper and more serious.

Creation takes things forward. Without anything new there is no progress. Creation equals new.

My intention is not to make clothes. My head would be too restricted if I only thought about making clothes.

In Comme des Garçons, I hardly do any sketches; there's no fittings on bodies, there's no models that come in and say, "Oh, a little bit like this." In the beginning, there isn't even a theme. It's like getting the whole world at your feet - to empty your mind of everything that's ever happened before, to get an empty space.