Raf Simons

“My challenge is to find a beautiful balance: to make women beautiful, to make a woman dream to wear a beautiful outfit.”

“The Chanel woman? I don't even need to see; I smell her from round the corner.”

“Fashion has a long interest in collaborative situations.”

“In fashion design, you can divide people into two groups. You have people who come with an aesthetic that is there forever, even if it evolves. Then you have people I call 'jumpers.' One season it can be this; the next season it's completely something else. I always knew I am more of a jumper.”

“In my opinion, Christian Dior was never, ever theatre.”

“Computers let people avoid people, going out to explore. It's so different to just open a website instead of looking at a Picasso in a museum in Paris.”

“I am somebody who focuses on a dialogue between generations - that's the drive of my work. I believe the young generation take the power; they'll take over at one point, but the older generation, they'll push it away only because of the fear. I'm the opposite; I'm curious.”

“I see there is a lot of behaviour in men's fashion, which is systematic. It's a lot about all these kind of clothes that can be easily combined with each other, and it's less and less, I think, about making a fashion statement.”

“Fashion is such an octopus. You're connected to so many people: suppliers, pattern makers, production teams, marketing teams, vendors.”

“I was growing up in the New Wave period, but that wasn't allowed in school. I remember moments when they wouldn't let four people dressed in black stand together on the playground.”

“You cannot have adoration without being criticized.”

“I want to get away from couture just being done for a picture or for a single moment on the red carpet. I want to try and convince women that couture can be worn in the day and that there's a reality and relevance there, because that's what Mr. Christian Dior wanted.”

“The fashion world doesn't know the word 'stop,' so you have to make sure there are sublime moments every day.”

“In the nineties, it was common to see people who expressed themselves through one designer - the Jil Sander woman, the Martin Margiela woman. You saw her on the street, and you knew who she was.”

“I'm usually very attracted to things that I can't define. If something's too clear, it's very often not inspiring to me anymore.”

“My ideas for the next collection always happen a couple of months before the show. I have learned to shut up and not bother my assistants with it.”

“I'd like to see fashion slow down a bit. What freaks me out about fashion today is the speed - the speed of consuming, the speed of ideas. When fashion moves so fast, it takes away something I always loved, which is the idea that fashion should be slightly elusive. Hard to grasp, hard to find.”

“Berlin is in a state of transition. There are lots of people who don't stay here. They pass through. They might not 'clean up,' but they mature. It is a city where people spend a significant time in their lives, and then they move on.”

“I'm a designer, and for me, things are always evolving, and such evolution is necessary.”

“My point of view is that if I love a certain kind of beauty, I want more of that beauty. I don't need 200 different beauties.”