Marc Jacobs Quotes

I'm someone who came to Paris as a teenager, and I dreamed of coming back to Paris as a visitor. I never dreamed of having a job at the biggest luxury house in Paris and, you know, 15 odd years later, I'm still here.

I'm not a yogi, but I know the sun salutation.

Basically, I'm in a kilt and a white shirt every day. So, you know, I don't have a lot of scope, and I'm really picky about what I wear. Even if it's weird, it's very particular to me. And you can't make a business out of what I would wear. We'd be out of business.

I still appreciate individuality. Style is much more interesting than fashion, really.

I have a lot of tattoos. My first tattoo I had when I was a teenager was just a little heart. I am very friendly with a great artist, Scott Campbell, and I started going to him to get tattoos. I'm very spontaneous about what I get.

I like the sort of 'nothingness' of the jeans and the T-shirt. I feel that's about as close as I can get to the future because it seems like something so old that will always be, so I feel it's a safe bet for the future.

I think scent is sensual. I guess evoking a mood or a spirit is key, and I think with the women's fragrances we have evoked different types, moods or sensibilities of a woman - whether it's Daisy with the sweetness and the innocence or Lola which is more provocative, sexy and sultry.

I guess when I look over my shoulder at other designers, I feel like people are so definitive. It's so clear to me what their aesthetic is, what they're projecting. And I look at my own work and I think, Who could ever decipher what the hell is going on?

For people that don't have any interest in the psychology of nuance, who need everything to be in their face, who don't want to analyze ... those aren't the people I romanticize about dressing.

I like people who have a sense of individuality. I love expression and anything awkward and imperfect, because that's natural and that's real.

Let's do what we love and do a lot of it.

I like spending time at home. In Paris, people drop by and have a bite to eat, or they drop by and watch Friends on TV. I take my dog to the office there, and I walk to work sometimes.

I'd like to believe that the women who wear my clothes are not dressing for other people, that they're wearing what they like and what suits them. It's not a status thing.

I think of many people and no one as a muse. I love the way Sofia looks always, and I love the way Kim looks always. Fashion may be part of their world, but it's not their whole life. It's not everything.

I've been openly gay since I can remember.

In terms of having a business, I wanted to let it go beyond what my personal taste is. Basically, I'm in a kilt and a white shirt every day. So, you know, I don't have a lot of scope, and I'm really picky about what I wear.

Life is a fashion show, the world is your runway.

I always find beauty in things that are odd & imperfect - they are much more interesting.

We don't need fashion to survive, we just desire it so much.

I mean, I'd love to have a private jet - I know people who fly by private jet all the time ... I've hitched a ride a few times and it is not overrated at all; it's a great way to travel!

My opinion about myself is so based on what other people think of me.

If they asked me, I would do anything for the 'South Park' guys.

I am Marc Jacobs by birth, but we are Marc Jacobs by the company that we built.

I do think that in order for a company to be interesting to the investment community, there needs to be a plan; there needs to be a bigger retail footprint. There needs to be this idea - DNA, lifestyle, words I hate.

Yes, I always remember my dad's, mom's and my grandma's perfumes.

I said, 'Okay, it's the year 2000, I'm getting a computer and a Palm Pilot.' I know how to check my e-mail, and I've listed some phone numbers on it. Half the time the battery has gone out so I can't use it.

When you design a dress you ask yourself, would woman like it or no. It's much more of a creative process, not a research or trying to make somethings that sells or appeals. I hope that it will appeal to somebody, but it isn't what drives me.

I don't believe in fashion dictatorship, and I find that anybody who follows the dictates of fashion is a bit lost. I'm excited by style, not so much by fashion.

I like characters. I like spirited characters whether they exist in fiction or real life. Whether they're the invention of artistic people or directors, musicians. I think music and art and fashion designers inspire me and I like characters.

Without any kind of real ego on my part, I just thought, I'm going to approach the people I admire and see if they want to do something together.

Sex is always good, isn't it? Well, actually it's not always good, but it's always a good thing.

I don't throw cell phones. I don't hurt people, I only hurt myself.

Staring up at the sky on a bright, sunny day makes me dream and gives me ideas.

Luxury is about pleasing yourself, not dressing for other people

We don't design by calculator or by demographics or anything like that. We really are a group of creative, sensitive people. We have our charmed little world where we get to make things. We're really lucky.

I'm not really well educated - other than an art survey course at the High School of Art and Design in New York when I was, like, 15. I don't know the history of art, but I got over intimidation from the art world when I realized that I was allowed to feel whatever I want and like whatever I want.

I believe that anything can be for men or women. I mean, I've worn a lace dress before!

Fashion isn't a necessity. It pulls at your heart. It's a whim. You don't need it. You want it.

Sometimes there are two very opposite directions, and we go with the stronger one at the end. It's an impulse thing, like, 'Oh, I love both so much, but it's got to be one or the other because the two don't work together.'

Sometimes, you just have to clear your head and get out to see other things. It is very important to be nourished. I love to go to museums and galleries, I like to see theatre, film, dance - anything creative. It doesn't promise you inspiration, but it nourishes your creative soul, and that's good.

My grandmother was amazing. She completely believed in me and was very encouraging. She would go to the supermarket or the butcher or wherever and tell people, 'My grandson is going to be the next Calvin Klein.'

For so many years, I felt so insecure, so inferior, and I still have those moments, but I have a newfound confidence since I got in shape and changed my diet.

I'd like to be invisible. To be anonymous and see things for what they really are. The truth may be painful but it's probably useful!

I am really glad to be working at the profession that I love.

Living in the past or living in the future - those aren't real. The moment is now, and that's where safety and comfort and all that good stuff is.

Happy, happy fashion. There is not much more to it than that.

Even mistakes can get you one step further.

We want to do sweaters for dogs and call it 'Bark Jacobs.' If it works, great. If it doesn't, we'll drop it and do something different.

I always say I lived my life with my grandmother. She was emotionally stable, and she was very encouraging to me.

I love to design for women, it's really open and very free. I always think of my friends. I think of both fictitious characters, real people from the past and the present. I am not a woman, but I find women so beautiful and so fascinating.

I don't see myself as being as big of an influence as other people seem to think.

I'm not a model, so the idea of modelling a suit or clothes is weird in itself.

What's comfortable to me is familiarity. Comfort has nothing to do with the size of the garment. I do find something quite comfortable and charming in a too-narrow shoulder, a sleeve that's too short or too long, a pant that's too high or too low, hems that are trod on.

The thing I most love and hate about fashion is that it changes all the time. But I don't think I or anyone else can singlehandedly get rid of hooker style. Popular taste isn't great by definition. It's just popular.

I don't find clothes sexy at all. I find people sexy.

Whether it's an $11 flip-flop or a $2 key ring or a $2,000 dress, they're all done with integrity. They're all done with a design sense. As long as the creativity exists, then I don't think it's a sellout. A sellout is putting your name on any piece of crap and then expecting people to buy it because it's got your name on it.

I empathize with women in their high heels so I'll be there in my kilt and T-shirt and I'll walk around all day just to prove that if I can wear the shoes for 36 hours then certainly our customer can wear them.

I love attention. Maybe my desire for attention is a little too out of control, but I'm very honest.

I've learned a lot about doing accessories and making shoes and handbags. I don't think my perspective has really changed. The subtlety of understanding yarns, what makes a fabric what it is - I've learned technical skills and more about the craft.

Design is a series of creative choices - it's a collaborative effort, an evolutionary process. You choose your fabrics depending upon what you want to say, then you work with mills to get those fabrics. Through the process, you realize what you want it to be.

Young girls need to learn that sexiness isin't about being naked.

It's sometimes said that I'm rebellious and I do things to push people's buttons, but I just like the challenge.

I'm not good at hiding my feelings. I'm also not good at lying. I'm very open about everything.

Awkwardness gives me great comfort. I've never been cool, but I've felt cool. I've been in the cool place, but I wasn't really cool - I was trying to pass for hip or cool. It's the awkwardness that's nice.

It's the things that aren't accepted as conventionally beautiful that I find more attractive.

I always say that I'm not the director, I'm part of the team.

I don't know, but I always loved that image of a girl putting toenail polish on a guy - her boyfriend, or something like that. Or a guy waking up in the morning and reaching over and putting on his girlfriend's shirt. Like Keith Richards putting on one of Anita Pallenberg's blouses, or Courtney Love putting nail polish on Kurt Cobain.

I love the gym, but I still want to look a bit awkward at it. I don't want to look too on top of it, you know?

I love my life. I can't believe I work in New York and Paris. That I work for Louis Vuitton. That I work for Marc Jacobs. It seems really weird every time I say my full name - like, that's me, and every time I hear the receptionist say my name, it's still weird.

Fashion is such a fairytale and it is such a fantasy. And it's about metamorphosis and sort of changing yourself and playing a part that you want people to see.

I like to make things. I like making choices, choosing colours, evoking a spirit, a change.

Creativity in any form stimulates creativity in every form, music, arts, literature ... I find inspiration in anything. It's all the same.

I don't think, 'Gee, I'd like to dress this person.' There was a picture in Us magazine. It was a jersey dress, and Courtney Love was wearing it. I have this thing about Courtney Love, this funny worship.

I love the entire ritual of getting dressed. When we do a fashion show, we try to send out a message; we couldn't do that without the hair and makeup. The whole is equal to the sum of its parts.

Innovation is an evolutionary process, so it's not necessary to be radical all the time.

I don't love Photoshop; I like imperfection. It doesn't mean ugly. I love a girl with a gap between her teeth, versus perfect white veneers. Perfection is just ... boring. Perfect is what's natural or real; that is beauty.

I go to the gym every morning for a couple of hours, then I come to work, whatever is on the plate for the day, I do it. I don't ask many questions, I go where I am told to.

I hate this idea that you have to love somebody because they are your family. Nobody can tell me what I'm supposed to feel and who I am supposed to feel it for.

I like to take on the thing I don't like at the moment. I like to find something that looks wrong or feels off, something that I would never have done in the past, like brocade. And then all of a sudden, if we can make brocade work, then we've really done something, because I hate it. And that's just a reference. I don't actually hate brocade.

One thing that is exciting about fashion is the surprise element. People don't know what they want. They just know when they see it.

You can never please everyone, and I think it's best not to.

I remember walking the dog one day, I saw a car full of teenage girls, and one of them rolled down the window and yelled, 'Marc Jacobs!' in a French accent.

It was never my desire to revolutionize fashion, to make clothes that could be in a museum. I want to create clothes that have a certain style, but I want to see them used. I want to see people enjoy the things I've made.

Sofia is so active, and she made The Virgin Suicides, which I thought was great - all these things are inspiring to me, not in terms of creating a particular dress, but just in terms of knowing that there is this type of woman out there.

We live in a world where people are really hungry for information, and they're not hungry for information on subjects that they're not interested in.

It just seemed too weird to me. I don't know, maybe they were smoking a joint in the car downstairs from their parents' apartment. I had to go that far to put together a scenario of how they could have possibly recognized me.

The best dresses are like t-shirts - you just put them on and forget about them.

My mind absorbs things in a funny way. I'm on planes quite a bit and I always take stacks and stacks of magazines and I go through them and tear pages out and fold them up, and they get stuck at the bottom of my backpack or whatever.

But the customer is the final, final filter. What survives the whole process is what people wear. I'm not interested in making clothes that end up in some dusty museum.

I have no problem going on record with this and probably have gone on record with this before, there aren't that many people who I respect. There just aren't.

Marc Jacobs is full of creative people and Louis Vuitton is again a name on the door, a name that has existed for many years but I'm a collaborator there and I bring in other people, other artists and I work with a great creative design team.

A sellout is putting your name on any piece of crap and then expecting people to buy it because it's got your name on it. That's what a sellout is to me.

I create the concept, which for me is about deciding upon the right girl and the right 'spirit', and thinking of all the things that visually describe her. It's just like putting together a fashion show; for me, that starts with the spirit and the girls as well.

I don't think there is ever a wrong time for a polka dot.

I love to take things that are everyday and comforting and make them into the most luxurious things in the world.

The Louis Vuitton woman is more about a quality - a quality within some women that needs to come forward, to be noticed and recognised.

I think it's an old fashioned notion that fashion needs to be exclusive to be fashionable.

Both my partner and I did not get into cooking so that we could wear ugly chef's coats and stuff. We dress sexy in the kitchen.

I love a blouse that's dumb. I love to use the word 'dumb.' It's not knowing, and the word 'blouse' is so out of fashion that I love it - 'a blouse that's dumb.'

Clothes mean nothing until someone lives in them.