we who see

Sometimes I get surprised by the young people, want to have the result sooner and they’re thinking now everything changed, you can be noticed, you can be someone immediately because you have great style. Great style, okay, is something, but it’s not enough to be really a good worker. Your style is part of your imagination, but beyond your style has to be a deep experience also, a deep knowledge about fashion. Sometimes I notice no one remembers the last ten years of fashion. We can say it’s a young profession, but if we already have 50 years full of designer, full of history, no one remembers at least the last five years. The young generation doesn’t know.

But I never, never forget the preparation it took me. For fifteen years I was invisible because I was working behind everyone — the photographer, the camera. That’s also part of my style because I can recognize every different flavor of fashion. I know very well the last twenty years of fashion. Sometimes you say, “Oh that’s a fantastic look,” but this look is just a copy of some other look.

For me, fashion [is] also geology — you cannot understand now if you don’t know anything about last ten years of fashion at least. Someone doesn’t even remember Tom Ford, what that means. It’s so easy to forget in fashion. “Oh, this is brand-new.” It’s not brand-new, it’s just an evolution of what it was.