The clothes that fire up my emotions are colorful and 'different' pieces. My eye still picks out gilded-cloque glamour from among Burberry's streamlined trench coats or a hand-printed coat from Dries Van Noten.

I am grateful to have spent 25 years at the 'International Herald Tribune' - a newspaper where I had unstinting support in being able to express myself freely and honestly.

At the 'Times,' all journalists on every subject followed the same rules and were supposed to meet the same standards, so I never really thought about fashion writing as being in a bubble.

I don't really believe in elegance. Ever since I first came to France many years ago to do the Chambre Syndicale course, I always felt I was somehow lacking, first of all being British - obviously a disaster! But I was also puzzled with this idea that you have to tie your Hermes scarf just right, or you can only wear black.

We live in a media world simultaneously obsessed with technology and personality.

Thanks to social media like Facebook, Twitter and Goodreads, I can easily reach out to so many people. Being a writer gives me the added bonus of a targeted audience: readers, who enjoy targeted 'prizes' for participation in fundraisers - books and other neat promo items.

The dawn of the 21st century marked the emergence of the social media age.

Social media and I have had a very tumultuous relationship.