Christian Louboutin
I hate the idea of natural. For example, I prefer gardens to wild nature. I like to see the human touch. High heels are a complete invention - an extravagance. They're far from natural, but it's the impracticality that I adore. I prefer the useless to the useful, the sophisticated to the natural.
There's nothing I liked visually of the period I was a child. There was no dream in it, and nothing sparkled.
I always loved fish for the colors and birds for the plumage. In the same way, I loved those women of the cabaret. They were birds of paradise.
People are proud of their tattoos. It's like a modern coat of arms.
I like to undress women - not to dress them. You know, like Manet's 'Olympia' or Helmut Newton's photographs - naked women with shoes. This is what I am trying to do.
I wanted to be a shoe designer, but I never thought it could be a profession. But what was the alternative? Doctor? Too dirty! Air-hostess? Maybe not! Then someone gave me a book on Roger Vivier, and, cheri, instantly I knew that was it!
The heel is engineering in itself. This little thing that supports the human weight has to have a precise balance.
For me there ain't no high heel high enough.
What was called extreme 20 years ago definitely isn't extreme anymore. When I started, I remember people saying, 'Oh my God, I can't walk in that!' It was like, three inches - they look like kitten heels now.
Shoes for men are about elegance or wealth, they are not playing with the inner character. That is why women are happy to wear painful shoes.
I really wish I had invented the flip-flop. I love flip-flops. It's the one style of shoe I would be so proud of inventing: the Havaiana.
I'm really not a fascist. Everyone wears what they feel great in, or comfortable with. It's a beautiful day, you have an armless shirt: it goes with flip-flops.
My drawing for women is really curvy. My drawings for men are actually quite angular.
When I'm doing a store in a country, I always like to consider the concept of the country and the city. Ask what are the clothes of the city, what does this city represent for me?
Something I really hate more than anything else is clogs.
A good host is someone who really takes care of everyone, from the food to their daily programme. I can't.
For women raised in the '70s, high heels can still carry a stigma; they're associated with being stupid, with just wanting to please a man. Other women find them empowering.
If the height of the heel is the same as the length of your foot, it starts to look wrong. And if the heel is positioned badly on the sole, you get into ballerina territory, where the body is pushed into a very strange posture. You can exaggerate the arch only so much.
To me, the word 'decadent' is so difficult to use; it's a very sensitive word, in a way.
A lot of my friends have tattoos; I realized that it's not only just a part of pop culture, but a bit of a map on someone's body, which says something about people. A part of their life, like an armor or a crest.
The highest heels I do are six-inch heels - but mostly only dancers can wear them, since they are used to being on point in ballet shoes.
I have always loved tartans - such an ornamented type of weaving, so vivid in colour, and such a masculine aspect. But actually, I think tartans can be feminine or masculine.
People tend to fear the ghosts in their own family. You feel these family curses and think, 'If it happened to my father, it could happen to me.'
A good pump is a silhouette, like the bone structure of the face. It's like a beautiful face with no make-up. You can cover a not-so-beautiful face with make-up, but it is just a mask - it is the same with shoes.
No woman wants to have fat ankles.
Women like my shoes because they look good on them, not because they look good on the rack.
I never had a plan. I have to say, I'm very shocked when people start a company and say, 'In five years I want to launch a perfume, or in 10 years I want to have this.' How can you know?
Bhutan is a very serene country with an incredible history. It has an incredible group of great artisans.
When I'm doing a store in a country, I always like to consider the concept of the country and the city.
If you're passionate about the world, and if you really look closely at everything around you, each thing can be transformed into a shoe, or into a part of a shoe.
I perfectly understand the obsession with shoes. I myself am pretty obsessed. I have a few hundred pairs of shoes in general, because I've been collecting shoes for a long time.
I love flip-flops. It's the one style of shoe I would be so proud of inventing: the Havaiana.
Everyone wears what they feel great in or comfortable with.
Madonna is a feminist and has been doing more for the cause than all the grumpy feminists, who are giving nothing back by being grumpy.
I could not live with someone 24/7. I just never did, and I could never do.
Sometimes women feel uncomfortable when men stare at them when they try on shoes.
I don't like conflicts. I'm not a competitive person at heart. To be in the middle of turmoil is boring.
I listen to my stomach. It tells me when I am starving.
I am very much into voices. I would say I'm a fan of voices, not of sound. I'm a fan of singers, not of bands.
My business partner gave me a drone, a small helicopter you pilot with an iPhone, and also it has a camera so you can see what it sees on the iPhone. Great fun. I fly it outside in Portugal. It's wonderful to oversee gardens.
I guess, being French, I love Hollywood.
I love David Lynch's 'Mulholland Drive;' such a wonderful movie.
The shoe is very much an X-ray of social comportment.
Shoes for men are about elegance or wealth; they are not playing with the inner character.
Everyone has their dates. For me, it's 1991. I can place every memory of my life either before or after this date. It's the year I became an adult. My mother died, and I created my company shortly thereafter.
Boredom is a concept that I don't understand.
Fashion isn't interesting when it comes from an uninspired place.
Necessity creates everything in my life.
There are few plants that are ugly. It's how you use them that may not be pretty.