I think every collection is always a move forward. It's the same work - the process is always the same. The interesting thing is to try to achieve a certain nothingness.

Nothing is impossible. Whatever idea comes up, we always try to make it. Sometimes it doesn't work because it's just not technically achievable. But you can always make things better, more contemporary with the construction, the inside, the weight, and all of that.

In Italy there is a supreme know-how and a desire to achieve that doesn't really exist anywhere else. You can't make clothes like that in America, because it's just not in the tradition.

There's another little vision in my life, going into a restaurant in New York years ago: All the women are sitting in their little strapless dresses with their cleavage, and there's this one woman in a sleeveless turtleneck and pants. And I can tell you that every man in that restaurant looked at that woman's arms. It was hypnotizing when everything was covered up. Just the face, the conversation - and you see the arms. And the arms and the hands become an obsession. I like that.

I think every collection is always a move forward. It's the same work - the process is always the same. The interesting thing is to try to achieve a certain nothingness.

Andrew Preston and I moved to Florida, to get some air. Am I going to live there forever? No, I'm not. But I have a warehouse, all white, concrete floors, a big, big space with very high ceilings and nothing inside. And that's where I go to work, and I like that because I just like to be alone and quiet. Is it explainable as a typical fashion designer? No. But am I a typical fashion designer? I don't think so.

It's the ultimate for me not to see how it's made. I find it vulgar when you can distinguish how something is made. I used to be a student at the Chambre Syndicale de la Haute Couture in Paris, and once I got to go to a Saint Laurent couture show. Everyone was always talking about how fabulous the tailoring was, but I was transfixed by this one particular dress. It was just a piece of fabric, but as the model was walking, you didn't know how she got into it, how it closed, where the seams were, and that, for me, was perfection. It stayed with me as a lifelong vision.