I just don't understand how you can not be concerned about your appearance. From time to time I'm vilified as the person who cares about the look of a teapot - and it's not that I believe my taste is superior , I just can not believe that other people don't care.

Fashion is the most intense expression of the phenomenon of neomania, which has grown ever since the birth of capitalism. Neomania assumes that purchasing the new is the same as acquiring value... If the purchase of a new garment coincides with the wearing out of an old one, then obviously there is no fashion. If a garment is worn beyond the moment of its natural replacement, there is pauperization. Fashion flourishes on surplus, when someone buys more than he or she needs.

The assumption must be that those who can see value only in tradition, or versions of it, deny man's ability to adapt to changing circumstances.

That's one of the things about getting older isn't it? You suddenly realise that you are what you set out to be. And there are no role models any more.

I wouldn't mind someone lobbing hand grenades at me, but having to reset the timer on the video recorder puts me into a blood-spitting frenzy.

Watteau is no less an artist for having painted a fascia board while Sainsbury's is no less effective a business for producing advertisements which entertain and educate instead of condescending and exploiting.

If you were born in Britain after World War II, you see a continuous atmosphere of decline, moral and economic and political.