I try to destroy taboo in fashion-which is something I learned as a kid. I come from the street, and you have to be a survivor.
No matter how much people in fashion think we're so cool and avant-garde, for most fashion people, creativity is quite taboo.
I love art and music more than I love fashion, to be honest.
For me, fashion is a job. I love it. It's my passion. But the most important thing for me in general is life.
We are Italian. We are all little tribes - not only in fashion, but also in music - in everything, basically.
If I am in fashion, it is really due to very few designers that I admire - not because I don't like the rest, or that the rest are not beautiful, but because I am very selective. I adore Versace. I adore Helmut Lang, despite the fact that it's over.
Sex is something I live very well, but it is something I revealed very slowly in my fashion. What I do is emotional. For me, there is a base, which is my Italian roots. It's a strong passion for fashion, a passion for sensuality and dressing for one's self.
I don't have anything against homes for the elderly, but my mom, after having nine children, after all the sacrifices, living in an apartment - it gave me anxiety. Being the only male in the family, I said, "No I can't let this happen." Therefore I signed, because I wanted to buy a house for my mom. I started at Givenchy and the whole fashion world was saying, "Couture is finished." No, couture is not finished. Couture has changed - thank goodness.
These five years as a couturier have really changed my way of seeing fashion and my confidence with fashion. Couture is a dream.
I started to draw and design clothes that I couldn't find, because everything was all luxury, fashion clothes or very straight. So I mixed all of that together: Who says I can't put a man in a skirt? Who says that a man can't wear lace? Who says that men can't wear Swarovski? Who says that men can't wear makeup? You know what I'm like; for me, straight, gay, women, men, trans, we're all the same. I don't see difference.
