Francois Nars

I like shocking, but I don't like to shock as an automatic process. Sometimes it happens, but it's not my main drive. ”

Having worked with so many of the geniuses, I'd learned so much. It's the best sort of photography school, to work with people like Penn or Avedon or Meisel. ”

Was I a businessman to start with? I'm not sure. I mean, that comes slowly, when you start having the products out. But at the same time, I was very determined. I knew that I had to make it work. I had no choice. ”

There is a tendency to feature more actresses on covers, but I'm a big model lover. I grew up watching these models, and they gave me the wish, the need, to work in the fashion industry. I loved watching them - their beauty, the way they worked in front of the camera and that power of transformation, especially in the Seventies. ”

I think there was a freedom in the 1920s and 1930s: a certain liberty and evolution of women. ”