Astrid Kirchherr

“I have never met a man who I could still say, 'That is the love of my life.' Stuart is. I never met anybody as full of love and giving as this young man.”

“I love Liverpool and it is great to be back in the city.”

“I was initially attracted to John when I first went to see them play. Then I got to know Stuart because he was John's best friend. Our hearts took over from there.”

“Stuart was a very special person and he was miles ahead of everybody. You know as far as intelligent and artistic feelings are concerned, he was miles ahead. So I learned a lot from him and because in the '60s we had a very strange attitude towards being young, towards sex, towards everything.”

“I was always introduced as the Beatles photographer and I gave it up in the end. I was so unsure of myself. Am I good or am I just the Beatles photographer? People were not interested in what I did before. I could not stand it any more.”

“You couldn't buy any English authors or anything that came from America, like jeans. It was impossible. So we had to do our own clothes if we had weird ideas like wearing long scarves like the French people did. You had to knit them yourself.”

“I like to choose the people I take photographs of, but when you make your living off it, you've got to take everybody.”

“The most important thing I gave the Beatles was my friendship. They trusted me: there was no fear in being photographed.”

“I always thought Stuart deserved a little bit of fame. He was a gifted artist and a very wonderful person.”

“Our post-war generation were struggling to escape the past and the burden of guilt we carried and to find a new way.”

“I was wanting something new, and for me the Beatles were... outstanding. I was breathless, speechless.”

“When I met the Beatles, they were wearing these funny little leather jackets, which inspired me. I had a suit made for myself out of fine, good black leather. It looked different. I was using leather but putting a different fashion angle on how it looked.”