This is very much part of my style, I work a lot on the back ­ - I love the back of clothes for men. I love even T-shirts printed behind. I think, "Why do you want to show only the front?"

In the beginning, to be honest I was super-scared. I turned up and took a step back and said, 'I am here to learn,' and I feel the same today. I've got only to learn from these people because they have been doing couture for 30 or 40 years, so I keep learning every season.

We are Italian. We are all little tribes - not only in fashion, but also in music - in everything, basically.

In prêt-à-porter now we understandably need to make the collection satisfy the big market more, so couture is extra special.

I used to hate to go to school, because when it was Friday afternoon and everybody was finished school, I knew I was going to work Saturday and Sunday.

When I went to England, to Saint Martins, I was traumatized, in a positive way. It was that British sense of transgression and the dark. Then when I went to Paris, I was doing couture, which everyone was saying was finished. Bullshit! For me, in the end, it was all a mixing of ingredients.

No matter how much people in fashion think we're so cool and avant-garde, for most fashion people, creativity is quite taboo.