September 11th was a moment when America had the sympathy of the world.

In my adult life I've understood that if I put an enormous amount of love and honesty into something, usually that shows in the end.

I find a bath meditative and usually prepare myself for the day in this manner.

I am tired of the cult of youth. The cultural rejection of old age, the stigmatization of wrinkles, grey hair, of bodies furrowed by the years. I am fascinated by Diana Vreeland, Georgia O’Keeffe and Louise Bourgeois, women who have let time embrace them without ever cheating. Society today condemns this, me, I celebrate it.

I love fashion. What I love is the ability to express yourself, to be able to make a product and shoot an ad campaign that tosses you out into the world and lets you have a voice in contemporary culture, iconography. I felt a little bit neutered not having that voice.

I'm a pretty calm person. That came from living in Italy for a long time. Nothing works, nothing is on time. You have to learn to deal with it.

If my parents had discouraged me, I would have turned out very differently. They raised me in an open-minded, liberal environment.