Raf Quotes

They see in the political apathy of the proletariat only the apathy, not the protest against a system that has nothing to offer them. ~ Red Army Faction

I'm usually very attracted to things that I can't define. If something's too clear, it's very often not inspiring to me anymore. ~ Raf Simons

On one occasion, Daniel Day-Lewis, Jeremy Irons and myself were due to appear at the Sarajevo film festival and were turned off a UN plane on orders from Geneva. We had to get local journalists to transport the films in for us. I tell you this only to demonstrate that festivals can be a lifeline. But, after all the difficulties I'd had in getting there, in 1996 I found myself being flown in on a four-seater RAF plane as an official guest, endorsed by the British Embassy. Ironically, the film I was to present was Mission: Impossible. ~ Vanessa Redgrave

Unlike fashion, art isn't applied. It doesn't have to serve anybody. It doesn't have to be there for any other reason than to give an impression of what the world is about. ~ Raf Simons

L.A. interests me, the whole band scene and relaxed carefree feel, but it does not mean you have to dress like a hippy. ~ Raf Simons

I know this independence is what people like most about my brand. ~ Raf Simons

I think it's different in fashion, because even if I would be an outsider, I would still be in the middle of the whole world of contemporary fashion. But it's interesting to think what outsider fashion could be. Does it mean to be completely disconnected from the regular system or just disconnected style-wise? ~ Raf Simons

My point of view is that if I love a certain kind of beauty, I want more of that beauty. I don't need 200 different beauties. ~ Raf Simons

When it's only clothes, that is not satisfying enough for me. I don't think I could do this for 10, 20 years if that was all. It also has to be about a psychology or a mentality or a concept. ~ Raf Simons

Dress codes and gestures and attitudes have always inspired me, as has youth culture in general, although now I question it more. If you analyze youth cultures over history, there has always been something strict about them - you have to be like this or like that. ~ Raf Simons

I always try to connect with what's happening in the world-reality, modernity, the 21st century, all that - and with Jil it started to feel very disconnected from the outside and how women were looking at fashion, experiencing fashion, interpreting fashion. ~ Raf Simons

I remember one time I went to Craigslist to find something; that's how bad I wanted it. It was a pair of Raf Simons - this was like 2010. But Raf said he was going to make them for me. ~ ASAP Rocky

Someone else knows," I said. "The three most dangerous words in the secrecy business. But there it is. I know, and Ms. Nice knows. Which is why we came back with the RAF. Because where would your plane have landed? Guantanamo, maybe. But it didn't, and we're back in America, free and clear. And we know. I'm sure you could crush Ms. Nice's career, but you'll never find me. I'll always be out there. And you know me, General. You've known me a long time. I don't forgive, and I don't forget. And I won't have to do much. Talking might be enough. Suppose the SVR found out it was you who got Khenkin killed? Some of those IOUs might get canceled. And they might retaliate. Rumors might start, about poor old Tom O'Day, who got so desperate he came up with a cockamamie scheme. ~ Lee Child

I fantasise about what the future could be in terms of aesthetic and psychology. It's the most difficult thing to do because you have to start from the past - your favourite architect, your favourite song - you take it all with you. ~ Raf Simons

In my opinion, Christian Dior was never, ever theatre. ~ Raf Simons

My own brand will stand or fall because of me. Dior won't fall if I fall. It will also still stand if I'm not there. I'm coming in there, and it's like a - I don't know the English word - like a passage. ~ Raf Simons

My challenge is to find a beautiful balance: to make women beautiful, to make a woman dream to wear a beautiful outfit. ~ Raf Simons

The city of Gloucester, by ancient custom, presented a lamprey pie to the sovereign at Christmas time, as a token of loyalty. Lampreys are scaleless freshwater sucker-fish resembling eels, desirable in the past for their oily, gamey flesh. The tradition of gifting lamprey pies to the royal family continued until the end of Queen Victoria's reign, but was revived for the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in 1953 when a 42-pound pie was cooked by the RAF catering crops. ~ Janet Clarkson

I don't really know; I'm not in the Operations Room, you see. All I do know is that the world has a Chief who was victorious when the powers of darkness struck at Him with everything they had. He has the plans today. The darkness won't last forever. There's a splendor beyond.
~Flying Officer George Dymory Ingleford, Enemy Brothers ~ Constance Savery

We're not feeling edgy; the system is feeling nervous. ~ Red Army Faction

I am always attracted to the moments when a person who is associated with a certain message, image or sensibility evolves. I am very interested in how audiences respond to that maturation and absorb the evolution. ~ Raf Simons

You do what you do. Or you do what you have to do. I don't know how to explain it better. I think that in the moment, you can't see connections, but sometimes afterwards you do. ~ Raf Simons

Sometimes words hang around longer than people, even when you don't want them to. ~ Onjali Q. Raúf

I'm very scared sometimes that fashion might attack its own magic by the amount of exposure. ~ Raf Simons

For me, Warhol made so much sense. ~ Raf Simons

And at the end of the evening he and Dym had made plans, airy ambitious plans, of all that they would do after the war. Euphemia had laughed at the planners. "What boundless energy you have, Jacob!" she had said.
Jacob had turned - Tony could see the dark, curly head and sparkling eyes quite plainly - and smiled at her. "Madam," he had said, "if I had a thousand lives, I could fill them all. ~ Constance Savery

If I see a fashion show with literal influences, it doesn't make me think any more. It doesn't make me dream. ~ Raf Simons

We piled aboard the small chopper and after a bit of map pointing to the pilot we lifted off.
"I love the RAF," said Jed.
"I love them too, sir," said I.
After a short flight the chopper landed. We all got out and waved our thanks and farewells to the crew and Major Jenner checked his map. After a quick examination he announced that we had been dropped in the wrong place.
"I fucking hate the RAF," said Jed.
"I fucking hate them too, sir," said I. ~ Ken Lukowiak

The future, for me, is romantic, I don't understand people who say the past is romantic. Romantic, for me, is something you don't know yet, something you can dream about, something unknown and mystical. That I find fascinating. ~ Raf Simons

Turkey, Lebanon, Pakistan and Ethiopia each take care of millions of refugees, and between them, outweigh the numbers of refugees taken in by all the 50 countries of Europe combined. ~ Onjali Q. Raúf

Becoming a fashion designer is agreeing with the fact that what you experience or what you see as free is also connected to a system. Does that mean giving up your freedom? I still don't know the answer. There's a very different kind of psychology going on in the fashion scene than in art. ~ Raf Simons

Our society wants things to grow, and our society wants things to become bigger and bigger. Everything has to be put under the spotlight. ~ Raf Simons

I see there is a lot of behaviour in men's fashion, which is systematic. It's a lot about all these kind of clothes that can be easily combined with each other, and it's less and less, I think, about making a fashion statement. ~ Raf Simons

Aeroplanes interested me, and at the outbreak of the Second World War, I joined the RAF as a volunteer reservist. I took the opportunity of studying the books which the RAF made available for radio mechanics and looked forward to an interesting course in radio. ~ Godfrey Hounsfield

As an industrial designer, you design the thing by yourself, and then it goes away from you, whereas fashion is in constant relation to the body and to psychology. It makes it more complicated, and it makes it more challenging. ~ Raf Simons

We Belgians love when we can go to L.A. because the city is amazing and the climate is fantastic. ~ Raf Simons

I'm not an isolated person. The more I connect to people, the more I have the feeling that things work. ~ Raf Simons

Berlin is in a state of transition. There are lots of people who don't stay here. They pass through. They might not 'clean up,' but they mature. It is a city where people spend a significant time in their lives, and then they move on. ~ Raf Simons

I don't see Dior as something that could become mine. I see it as a dialogue with the women who wear it. I want to stay connected to them rather than to an abstract brand. ~ Raf Simons

The psychology for the person who's actually doing it is completely different. I think I probably needed to put that [hired-hand] psychology in my own head to be able to do the job. Otherwise it would just be too scary. People outside make it much bigger than me. I'm not saying in my head, "Oh, my god, what an amazing idea!" It scares me if I would do that. ~ Raf Simons

You can instantly spot a Chanel woman, so I want to develop the Dior woman. ~ Raf Simons

In fashion design, you can divide people into two groups. You have people who come with an aesthetic that is there forever, even if it evolves. Then you have people I call 'jumpers.' One season it can be this; the next season it's completely something else. I always knew I am more of a jumper. ~ Raf Simons

We are very excited to re-launch the collaboration with Fred Perry. We have great appreciation for the heritage of the brand as well as their dynamism in guiding the brand towards the future. Their openness to create synergies between both our brands will bring interesting, creative results. ~ Raf Simons

There's a very different kind of psychology going on in the fashion scene than in art. When artists connect to a system because they want to make a living, it's their own choice. In fashion, designers don't have that choice. ~ Raf Simons

You don't like people?" Raf asked. "I don't like what people do to each other. ~ Matthew Reilly

It was the rootlessness that went with being the son of an RAF officer that shaped me. I had been to 11 schools by the time I was 9. ~ Jonathan Powell

Until I was eighteen, I did not know that you could study fashion design or art. I really didn't know. I already had my nose in the art world; I was already looking at things, but I didn't really get it that you could study that because my school was a very different environment. ~ Raf Simons

Following this logic, to bomb BASF in Ludwigshafen would be to mock the people who bombed BASF in Brazil. The Latin American comrades feel differently. BASF does as well. ~ Red Army Faction

I was raised in a very happy nest by very happy people, and I like to think that those are enough ingredients to make me succeed at Dior. ~ Raf Simons

What I've been conscious of, from the beginning is that I can't be Jil Sander. ~ Raf Simons

I was growing up in the New Wave period, but that wasn't allowed in school. I remember moments when they wouldn't let four people dressed in black stand together on the playground. ~ Raf Simons

I like very much to put on fashion shows. ~ Raf Simons

Antwerp literally was a trash hole, but fashion changed that. The designers there were extreme, and their work was hard to understand. But now, people from all over the world come to Antwerp to shop. ~ Raf Simons

I mean, I'm not antisocial or anything, but I sometimes don't see the point of hanging out with a whole bunch of people at a party if all you really want to do is hang out with just one person. ~ Mindy Raf

My education was paid for by the RAF Benevolent Fund, so a charity school, run like an orphanage, with uniforms and beatings. It was tough, but it got me to Cambridge - like being a chrysalis suddenly becoming a butterfly. ~ Eric Idle

My own show with Sterling Ruby, for example, seems like such a huge disconnection from Dior couture, but then I think, yeah, in both collections there was a very strong focus on the human hand and the actual work of people making garments. So in that sense, they were completely related. But I didn't realize that during the process. ~ Raf Simons

My dad only ever talked about two things: bicycles and Mercedes. ~ Raf Simons

I'm a designer, and for me, things are always evolving, and such evolution is necessary. ~ Raf Simons

I'm fascinated by the way Diane Arbus saw things. She came from this fashion background and then twisted it. ~ Raf Simons

Fashion is such an octopus. You're connected to so many people: suppliers, pattern makers, production teams, marketing teams, vendors. ~ Raf Simons

And even being in the middle of it, at the LVMH group with Dior, there are certain parts of it that I'm just not really in, because it's not in me or my nature. The whole scene around it, the events, the photography ... It's never really been my thing. But I don't take a critical position on people who are very much about that either. ~ Raf Simons

Computers let people avoid people, going out to explore. It's so different to just open a website instead of looking at a Picasso in a museum in Paris. ~ Raf Simons

But overall I want to make sure people fall in love with the clothes and that they are satisfied ~ Raf Simons

In the nineties, it was common to see people who expressed themselves through one designer - the Jil Sander woman, the Martin Margiela woman. You saw her on the street, and you knew who she was. ~ Raf Simons

You cannot have adoration without being criticized. ~ Raf Simons

I thought I'd join the RAF and become a wing commander. I realised this wasn't possible, although I do have a pilot's licence. ~ Mike Oldfield

I never really have to sit at a desk thinking, 'What should I do now?' It doesn't work like that for me, and it never has. My thinking process is constant. ~ Raf Simons

As a journalist, I cannot help imagining with excitement a new era with a face-off between Hedi Slimane at YSL and Raf Simons at Dior - a magnificent battle of style and wills to echo the Armani/Versace, Gucci/Prada or even Chanel/Schiaparelli face-offs of earlier years. But I remind myself that this is not a game of chess. ~ Suzy Menkes

My aim is a very modern Dior, but at the end of the day, I also look back, ~ Raf Simons

I am somebody who focuses on a dialogue between generations - that's the drive of my work. I believe the young generation take the power; they'll take over at one point, but the older generation, they'll push it away only because of the fear. I'm the opposite; I'm curious. ~ Raf Simons

Fashion is so mass-produced now; I hope there will come a refocus on how people see couture. And I would also hope for a new focus on the craft. ~ Raf Simons

I'd like to see fashion slow down a bit. What freaks me out about fashion today is the speed - the speed of consuming, the speed of ideas. When fashion moves so fast, it takes away something I always loved, which is the idea that fashion should be slightly elusive. Hard to grasp, hard to find. ~ Raf Simons

We all know and we all perceive Christian Dior in a very specific way. ~ Raf Simons

I spent my earliest years in Colwyn Bay in north Wales with my mother and grandmother, while my father was stationed with the RAF in India. ~ Terry Jones

Robert Gober, for example. He doesn't seem like somebody who is just going to show in a gallery that asks him to show. He's just making his work, and when he's ready, he's going to show it. ~ Raf Simons

I had to leave school at 14 because my father got injured in the mines and I had to support my family. I was an undertaker's assistant, then a plasterer, before doing my military service in the RAF. All the while, I was doing amateur dramatics and dreaming of getting a scholarship to the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School. ~ Brian Blessed

It would be nice to be a professional pilot. I'm an amateur pilot at the moment. I've got a lot of friends in the RAF and I don't think I've ever met a group of people who love their job as much as they do. ~ Martin Shaw

I once met an RAF pilot who told me of what he called a "bird strike". This, rather unfairly in my view, made it sound as if it was the bird's fault; as if the little feathered chap had deliberately tried to head-butt twenty tons of metal travelling in the opposite direction at just under the speed of sound, out of spite. ~ Hugh Laurie