Anouska Hempel

“You've got to be the best at what you can do - be the best at it! And the best has to be the best; you can't just fiddle around and hope.”

“India. From Goa to Kerala and Mumbai, it gets me every time. It's the food, the people, and the colours. The magical atmosphere and the accepting nature of the locals.”

“My father wanted a boy. I was supposed to be called Albert. That was probably the beginning of why things got so complicated, because I wasn't a boy.”

“From the age of five, I was organizing everybody's everything. If I didn't like the way it looked, I'd rearrange it. From a very early age, I saw life from my point of view.”

“If I set off to do something, why not do it properly? Otherwise, what's the point?”

“Everything I've ever done has been because of travel. Right from leaving Australia to where I am today - it's all been about exchanging different points of view. The most important lesson I've learnt is to look and listen to what's happening around you.”

“The architect who first inspired me to follow this profession was Sir John Soane and his Regency home; well, his three homes, now a museum. The place is like an encyclopedia of paintings, antiquities, furniture, sculptures, and drawings.”

“I'd always been acutely sensitive to my surroundings - and aware that I could make them rather than just observe them. So I began by designing interiors for myself, for friends, for clients - I just felt that I'd discovered my element, and those who really looked at what I was doing liked it - and the rest followed.”

“'It can't be done' is not a phrase I recognize.”

“I get up in the morning, look around, arrange and rearrange things, and imagine how I might like them to look. Why doesn't everybody?”

“I think if you have an eye and the ability and the confidence as a designer, you can turn your hand to anything.”

“I buy the best fabrics from small mills in Italy. That is the basis for my clothes.”

“England used to be known for making beautiful things. Then we became the rag trade, known for our street fashions, which were picked up around the world. I want us to be recognized for quality. We have the hands to make the clothes. What we need is the motivation.”

“I feel that, historically, the Art Deco period has the most resonance for me. As a person, it has to be the plucky Clara Bow, the heroine of American silent movies of the 1920s. She embodied feminine dressing mixed with men's style. All this then evolved into the exquisite style and simplicity of Coco Chanel.”

“Good people can get you out of a thousand problems with charm and kindness.”

“It was the corner sweet-shop in Australia that first piqued my interest in interior design. I went into this space with a mixture of apprehension and excitement as a child. It was filled, floor to ceiling, with the most incredible rounded glass bowls filled to the brim with bonbons, buttons, and sweets.”