I think prejudice and tradition count for three-quarters in matters of religion.
The way a dancer can bring the crowd to its feet with a drawn-out, well-executed pirouette is the excitement I wanted to capture with this design.
My mother was extremely controlled, sort of flawless. And I always tend to be a bit more hippie.
It's hard to balance everything. It's always challenging.
Certainly a big challenge for me with evening-wear is to make it look modern and artistic and avant-garde. The very concept of a ball gown is not in itself a modern concept, and women need to wear that for a certain presence in Hollywood. I'm also aware that a starlet might go to more than one place that night so the piece could also offer, maybe not a revolution, but an evolution.
I think there's going to be a real push in the next two years in Asia - China and Korea specifically. And that's a huge undertaking. Ten years ago it was impossible to break into that part of the world. Some of the biggest companies in the world found it challenging. But I am Chinese-American and I think what we do will resonate in China. So that's where we see our biggest opportunities going forward. I do speak Mandarin and I also relate to the hunger that China has for culture and architecture and style.
I've been designing since I was 8. I started sketching dresses I could wear when skating. I was always involved in all aspects of skating, not just the technique, the choreography, the music, but the visual aspects, too - what I should wear.
I'd rather have my teeth drilled than listen to that awful song, 'Fly, Eagles Fly. '
It is always worth itemising happiness, there is so much of the other thing in a life, you had better put down the markers for happiness while you can.
He who hopes for spring with upturned eye never sees so small a thing as Draba. He who despairs of spring with downcast eye steps on it, unknowing. He who searches for spring with his knees in the mud finds it, in abundance.
We only have this one moment: NOW.