LOOK issue
aRUDE comment
ONLINE content
ARBITERS
Pube King John Waters' Real Life Reality Show interview by Brandon Judell
Room with a View Ismail Merchant's World Travels interview by Brandon Judell
Under the Influence Publisher Delano Greenidge interview by Samuel Jamier
Hard Love Edmund White’s Dark Culture interview by Brandon Judell
French Lieutenant's Woman Author Christine Orban's Faithful Lover
BEAUTY
Beauty Illustrated photography by Olivier Rose
A Girl's Best Friend jewelry photography by Kimio Takeyama
BON APPETIT
Questions For Daniel Boulud by Jody Emmet
Questions For Thomas Keller by Jody Emmet
FASHION
The Idealizing Vision photography by Olivier Rose & Kustaa Saksi
The Perfect Form Chado by Ralph Rucci Essay and interview by Iké Udé
The Conformist photography by Calliope
The Large Glass Aprés Duchamp photography by Norman Watson
Pop photography by Norman Watson
KULTURE & ART CINEMA
Being Sissy Eternal Ingenue Sissy Spacek interview by Brandon Judell
The Seducer Actor Stuart Townsend interview by Brandon Judell
Loosed Woman Ascending Star Kimberly Elise interview by Brandon Judell
Still Pretty Christopher Walken interview by Brandon Judell
PHOTOGRAPHY
Hot Stuff 30 Porn Star Portraits by Timothy Greenfield-Sanders interview by Stephen Greco
Intense Attraction Photographer Patrick McMullan interview by Patrick McDonald
ART
Miami Heat Craig Robins interview by Odili Donald Odita
LEGEND
Je t'aime Icon, Activist, Handbag, Jane Birkin interview by Brandon Judell
Stories of O King of Color and Cut Stephen Burrows interview by Patrick McDonald
OFF THE WALL GREEN IS OUR COLOR
Luigi Leonard Polla
Kenneth Lubbock
Reginald Van Lee
REVIEW
aRUDE Comment by Iké Udé
Shakespeare & Company The Bride and the Bachelors: Duchamp and Company interview by Da Costa Greenidge
Shakespeare & Company The Bride and the Bachelors: Duchamp and Company by Da Costa Greenidge book reviews by Da Costa Greenidge
Corrections
Telescope A close-up of the stars, notables, scenesters and picturesque dilettantes.
SHELTER & DESIGN
Design For Living Joe Nahem interview by Cator Sparks
Floral Design K.J. Dinnhaupt
STYLE
Pardon Our Apparance Young Lad circa 1910
Pardon Our Apperance Luigi Ontani circa 1970's
15 Minutes Plus Perennial Deejay and Producer Jerome Sydenham by Anicée Gaddis
15 Minutes Plus Hat-Maker Extraordinaire Rod Keenan by Cator Sparks
Element of Style aRUDE's template for style
Style File Precious Jewelry Designer Mish Tworkowski
Fantasy & Simulacrum Timothy Greenfield-Sanders
aRUDE comment
look_issue_rrucci.php
ONLINE content
ARBITERS
Pube King John Waters' Real Life Reality Show interview by Brandon Judell
Room with a View Ismail Merchant's World Travels interview by Brandon Judell
Under the Influence Publisher Delano Greenidge interview by Samuel Jamier
Hard Love Edmund White’s Dark Culture interview by Brandon Judell
French Lieutenant's Woman Author Christine Orban's Faithful Lover
BEAUTY
Beauty Illustrated photography by Olivier Rose
A Girl's Best Friend jewelry photography by Kimio Takeyama
BON APPETIT
Questions For Daniel Boulud by Jody Emmet
Questions For Thomas Keller by Jody Emmet
FASHION
The Idealizing Vision photography by Olivier Rose & Kustaa Saksi
The Perfect Form Chado by Ralph Rucci Essay and interview by Iké Udé
The Conformist photography by Calliope
The Large Glass Aprés Duchamp photography by Norman Watson
Pop photography by Norman Watson
KULTURE & ART CINEMA
Being Sissy Eternal Ingenue Sissy Spacek interview by Brandon Judell
The Seducer Actor Stuart Townsend interview by Brandon Judell
Loosed Woman Ascending Star Kimberly Elise interview by Brandon Judell
Still Pretty Christopher Walken interview by Brandon Judell
PHOTOGRAPHY
Hot Stuff 30 Porn Star Portraits by Timothy Greenfield-Sanders interview by Stephen Greco
Intense Attraction Photographer Patrick McMullan interview by Patrick McDonald
ART
Miami Heat Craig Robins interview by Odili Donald Odita
LEGEND
Je t'aime Icon, Activist, Handbag, Jane Birkin interview by Brandon Judell
Stories of O King of Color and Cut Stephen Burrows interview by Patrick McDonald
OFF THE WALL GREEN IS OUR COLOR
Luigi Leonard Polla
Kenneth Lubbock
Reginald Van Lee
REVIEW
aRUDE Comment by Iké Udé
Shakespeare & Company The Bride and the Bachelors: Duchamp and Company interview by Da Costa Greenidge
Shakespeare & Company The Bride and the Bachelors: Duchamp and Company by Da Costa Greenidge book reviews by Da Costa Greenidge
Corrections
Telescope A close-up of the stars, notables, scenesters and picturesque dilettantes.
SHELTER & DESIGN
Design For Living Joe Nahem interview by Cator Sparks
Floral Design K.J. Dinnhaupt
STYLE
Pardon Our Apparance Young Lad circa 1910
Pardon Our Apperance Luigi Ontani circa 1970's
15 Minutes Plus Perennial Deejay and Producer Jerome Sydenham by Anicée Gaddis
15 Minutes Plus Hat-Maker Extraordinaire Rod Keenan by Cator Sparks
Element of Style aRUDE's template for style
Style File Precious Jewelry Designer Mish Tworkowski
Fantasy & Simulacrum Timothy Greenfield-Sanders
RALPH RUCCI the perfect form
interview & essay Iké Udé
Ralph Rucci at Haute Couture Collection 2004
photography Dan & Corina Lecca click image to enlarge Ralph Rucci, who has at last achieved proper recognition as the premier American-born fashion designer, toiled in obscurity for nearly two decades. All that time Mr. Rucci stayed his ground, refusing to compromise, honing and perfecting his work, remaining a best-kept secret. Yet despite the hypocrisy of the fashion press, the industry's aversion to the seamless, the coarse eyes of fashionistas, he was destined to ascend to his current post as impresario of eleganteria. Mr. Rucci's palette, his poeticism with cut, and his almost illicitly sumptuous employment of extraordinary fabric form a pronounced demonstration of comely grace.
Born in Philadelphia, Ralph majored in philosophy at Temple University, followed up with a stint at FIT, then took a job at Halston. The latter's assistant had worked for the redoubtable couturier, Cristobal Balenciaga, a man who would not sleep until he realized the perfect sleeve. Mr. Rucci shares his quest for the rarefied form, charming in its stubbornness, audacious in its fancy, rewarding in its occasional attainability. In this perfectionism he was the contemporary heir to the likes of Chanel, Madame Grès, Dior, Vionette and Yves Saint Laurent.
The Rucci enigma came in full focus in 1994 with Chado, named after a Japanese tea ceremony typified by elegance, Apollonian sympathy and an all-encompassing spiritual aura. Then, in 2002, the Federation of Francaise de la Couture — the Paris equivalent of a sartorial Hall of Fame — indoctrinated Mr. Rucci. He accelerated his grand potential with boldly heraldic hues, indeterminate yet evocative of taupe, topaz, lapis lazuli, rubies, white jade, agate, aquamarine, yellow topaz, and peculiar pink. Not since the pre-WWII designer, Mainbocher, Wallis Simpson Windsor's favorite, had an American in Paris attained this august membership, or been so showered with Gallic succés fou.
Today, following his triumphant Spring 2005 show at the Bryant Park carnival, Mr. Rucci seems like Mohammed Ali in his prime, faced with merely third-rate contenders. "You can always tell Ralph's clothes by the shape of a jacket, the curve of a seam," says Neiman Marcus's Fashion Director Joan Kaner, who lobbied to get the store to embrace his work after discovering it in the early '90s. An immediate convert, she loved the sensuousness of the designer's approach, down to the silk charmeuse linings: "Even when you put your hand in your pocket, it feels luxurious." Arbiters of style like Lee Radziwill agree: "I can only say that everything he does is so beautifully done."
At his Upper East Side penthouse, a touch monastic, Mr. Rucci perched, half-feline, half-Buddha on black leather upholstered bench. The designer deliberated on the forms, colors, treatment and authorial fabric that inform his work, all the while gesturing at the headless ancient statuaries, figurines, Cy Twomblys, and other choice objects in his living room that serve as his muses. Indeed, one detects in his work the subtle calligraphy of Twombly, the alchemy of Beuys, the effervescence of Helen Frankenthaler, the formal classicism of Leonardo de Vinci, the brute allure of Francis Bacon — a conspiracy of elegance chaired by Mr. Rucci. There is about the designer the finely wrought sensibility of James Whistler and the imperial subjectivity of John Singer Sargent.
Walter Pater once decreed "to burn always with this gem-like flame, to maintain this ecstasy, is success in life." Billie Holiday sang, "Nice work if you can get it." Ralph Rucci has unquestionably achieved success, and he is wonderfully at work.
Iké Udé: Why do the practice and exaltation of beauty appear so radical a position today?
Ralph Rucci: If people think like this, it is only out of fear, because mediocrity is the norm; they accept it. They are angered by beauty, fearful of it, because it is so hard to attain. Too many people emphasize sex; I prefer the cerebral. My idea of beauty tends to figurines and broken figures of statuaries. The form is what I feel so stimulating.
IU: Can your work be construed as a crusade against the overwhelming vulgarity and gimmickry of contemporary fashion, especially that of the American fashion world?
RR: Mediocrity on all levels must consistently be argued against. For two decades, I have lost my shirt twice. I am so pleased, honored and humbled that within my collection I attempt to attain perfection; we don't obtain it every season, but we do approach it. Every time we have political elections, the issue of mediocrity becomes so obvious. We are not the majority. But our power as a minority is so much stronger that the huge majority.
IU: What processes inform each of your collections?
TS: I pick up those concepts that were not fully realized from previous collections and begin to work on them. For instance, the relief effect in double-face seaming began in the fall couture in July; by the time we showed the spring ready-to-wear in September, we had evolved it into ready-to-wear: raincoats, hats, skirts, evening dresses. Also my intention now is to use my artwork — almost like an unconscious investigational tool to find new ways of cutting and making clothes.
IU: I find your choice of the word "clothes" odd. You don't really make clothes, do you? People don't buy your work because they simply need to cover up.
RR: I love your point. I make vessels that mirror extraordinary individuals. Eve Orton, who was the fur and fabric editor at Harpers under Diana Vreeland and one of my best friends, said the same thing to me in the early 1980s: You don't make clothes. It is pretentious of me to not consider them clothes, though; you can talk of them in that matter but I cannot. I actually sell these. If they were not worn, they would be something else. That is why I am investigating the artistic variables — why I design couture.
IU: In an interview with aRUDE, the painter Chuck Close remarked that he once restricted himself to a color or non-color palette of black and white, which made him more resourceful. Are you inclined to such discipline?
RR: I have been. My entire career has been the palette of black, white, beige and taupe. Any other color you experience in my work has been an attempt to evolve; to leave it and go on to more. I have been forcing myself to select colors to liberate myself from the comfort of black, white and beige. I can make an entire collection in taupe; it is the shadow and the mystery of the mind's eye. But just because I like taupe, I cannot expect the public to only want taupe; one must think of a variety of people. We have an enormously refined public purchasing the clothes. Halston taught me that super-rich women want color. I don't use color. In fashion, unlike fine art, you have to find a common ground with your client.
IU: Your Spring 2005 show had a certain performative, dance theatricality: Pina Bausch came to mind.
RR: I adore Pina Bausch. Do you remember when the concrete wall fell, and the cider blocks and dust went into everyone's faces? Incredible, perfect — that was the performance for me. At that point, I left. In a sense, Muccia Prada is the essence of Pina Bausch — and I'm not talking about her black nylon handbags. I am talking about her exploration into the unusual.
IU: Speaking of Halston…
RR: What a genius! There are companies that still exist today off the Halston technique. He demystified the bias cut. We think of Vionette as the originator and Madame Grés as the experimenter. Halston brought the bias cut into normalcy by using it for everything, from daytime skirts to evening wear. He proved that a designer could have his own retail, made-to-order couture. He refused to use the word couture.
The man running the Halston workroom apprenticed with Balenciaga, so I went there to learn the Balenciaga technique. I was a young upstart; I forced myself into that world. I have notes from that period recording who was there, what they wore, what they said. I would just listen.
This profession doesn't honor anyone. We need to honor our originals, those who have shown us the way like James Gallanos. Elsa Peretti I honor: the most visionary jewelry artist alive today — let alone feminist. Elsa, Halston, Balenciaga were all about the rigor of technique. Not letting go until the armhole is perfect.
IU: Do you use Elsa's work in conjunction with your shows?
RR: I do. The most genius things she ever made: a bicycle clip, now a collector's item. Pure, simple perfection. Drives me out of my mind when I open up daily trade journals and see collections of utter mediocrity receiving rave reviews. Pathetic; it all bespeaks the politics of our industry.
IU: Do you use Elsa's work in conjunction with your shows?
RR: I do. The most genius things she ever made: a bicycle clip, now a collector's item. Pure, simple perfection. Drives me out of my mind when I open up daily trade journals and see collections of utter mediocrity receiving rave reviews. Pathetic; it all bespeaks the politics of our industry.
IU: How do you distinguish Haute Couture from sportswear?
RR: I don't.
IU: The Russian Expressionist painter Wassily Kandinsky wrote about "the spiritual in art." Is there possibly the spiritual in fashion as well?
RR: Yes absolutely. Those who had it: Balenciaga, Charles James, Madame Grés.
IU: Chanel?
RR: Coco Chanel was about the persona more than the clothes.
IU: Do you think she did it deliberately?
RR: Everything about Chanel was deliberate. Everyone loved her because she controlled everything. When she took the understructure out of the jacket after the war, she knew it emancipated women. When she came back, she used her history as her handle.
IU: How much of fashion is advertisement versus substance?
RR: All of it, except for eleven houses.
IU: Globally speaking?
RR: Absolutely!!
IU: What role do extraordinary fabrics play in your collections? Would your overall work suffer immensely without such fabrics?
RR: I would close the door if I had to use synthetics. Rare, luxurious fabrics whisper. Such fabrics help to develop new cuts. Synthetics have no longevity; they are for the moment. For me the most extraordinary fabric is double-face cashmere. We have to allow the fabric to speak and synthetics do not have a wonderful vocabulary.
IU: How do you maintain the overall quality of your work?
RR: Great question. I have my own production workrooms in-house, overseen by the most honorable man I have ever met. His name is Mr. Kim. He has the desire of perfection within his soul.
IU: In your fashion shows, you have a varied age range of models. Is this a commentary about our obsession with the unbearable cult of youth?
RR: I use the girls that touch my heart first. Most often I use models that are known. When they span various age groups, it points to the fact that young has nothing to do with age. What propels us forward is the intelligence of wisdom and age.
IU: Of which collections are you proudest?
RR: I could cry: the very first couture show I had in Paris, a fall collection, which I adored. There was a spring collection in 2000 where I had the models walk around three sculptures from Yves Dana. That collection was incredibly important for my career. They have all been learning steps. The only one collection I was unhappy with — although financially, it was one of our best — was the Spring 2002, which I showed at the Sony music studio. Accidentally the music stopped. The technicians messed up the music; all you could hear was the footsteps and utter silence. Six sets of heels and no sounds. Everyone said the collection was fantastic; they thought I did it on purpose. I freaked out on the technicians. Then, as if by miracle, when Alek Wek stepped on the runway, the music started again. It was metaphysical.
IU: By that you mean…?
RR: Religion is a great part of my life. I pray a great deal. I ask through my prayers to create everything inside me. I don't feel I do this all alone. Christianity is my first religion. The Zen part of it is just the calm.
IU: You deserve comparison to such august talents as Christian Dior, Yves Saint Laurent, Cristobal Balenciaga, Coco Chanel. What accounts for their enduring appeal?
RR: Ruth Montgomery wrote a book called Strangers Amongst Us. The book is about individuals that have come to our planet to show us the direction. These are such individuals.
IU: What do your clothes conceal or reveal about you?
RR: My passion and my desire to meet standards that I create based upon the rigor I desire. Over the past three years the work is beginning to reveal more about me. I am beginning to experiment with the sexual tension, which can coexist with the cerebral.
IU: Some artists take a break, then continue, uninspired. When should one get off-stage?
RR: When I go to Europe to begin work for the next season, I hide. I don't go to parties; I don't feel comfortable doing that. You cannot take a hiatus as a fashion designer; it is perceived as a sign of weakness. You must allow the process to occupy your blood. Once you leave, you cannot come back.
IU: How do you measure success?
RR: Success for me is to be able to live with myself calmly. No one gave me anything. As my business grows, instead of buying a car, I buy art. I am possessed by it. I buy things that stimulate me.
interview & essay Iké Udé
Ralph Rucci at Haute Couture Collection 2004
photography Dan & Corina Lecca click image to enlarge Ralph Rucci, who has at last achieved proper recognition as the premier American-born fashion designer, toiled in obscurity for nearly two decades. All that time Mr. Rucci stayed his ground, refusing to compromise, honing and perfecting his work, remaining a best-kept secret. Yet despite the hypocrisy of the fashion press, the industry's aversion to the seamless, the coarse eyes of fashionistas, he was destined to ascend to his current post as impresario of eleganteria. Mr. Rucci's palette, his poeticism with cut, and his almost illicitly sumptuous employment of extraordinary fabric form a pronounced demonstration of comely grace.
Born in Philadelphia, Ralph majored in philosophy at Temple University, followed up with a stint at FIT, then took a job at Halston. The latter's assistant had worked for the redoubtable couturier, Cristobal Balenciaga, a man who would not sleep until he realized the perfect sleeve. Mr. Rucci shares his quest for the rarefied form, charming in its stubbornness, audacious in its fancy, rewarding in its occasional attainability. In this perfectionism he was the contemporary heir to the likes of Chanel, Madame Grès, Dior, Vionette and Yves Saint Laurent.
The Rucci enigma came in full focus in 1994 with Chado, named after a Japanese tea ceremony typified by elegance, Apollonian sympathy and an all-encompassing spiritual aura. Then, in 2002, the Federation of Francaise de la Couture — the Paris equivalent of a sartorial Hall of Fame — indoctrinated Mr. Rucci. He accelerated his grand potential with boldly heraldic hues, indeterminate yet evocative of taupe, topaz, lapis lazuli, rubies, white jade, agate, aquamarine, yellow topaz, and peculiar pink. Not since the pre-WWII designer, Mainbocher, Wallis Simpson Windsor's favorite, had an American in Paris attained this august membership, or been so showered with Gallic succés fou.
Today, following his triumphant Spring 2005 show at the Bryant Park carnival, Mr. Rucci seems like Mohammed Ali in his prime, faced with merely third-rate contenders. "You can always tell Ralph's clothes by the shape of a jacket, the curve of a seam," says Neiman Marcus's Fashion Director Joan Kaner, who lobbied to get the store to embrace his work after discovering it in the early '90s. An immediate convert, she loved the sensuousness of the designer's approach, down to the silk charmeuse linings: "Even when you put your hand in your pocket, it feels luxurious." Arbiters of style like Lee Radziwill agree: "I can only say that everything he does is so beautifully done."
At his Upper East Side penthouse, a touch monastic, Mr. Rucci perched, half-feline, half-Buddha on black leather upholstered bench. The designer deliberated on the forms, colors, treatment and authorial fabric that inform his work, all the while gesturing at the headless ancient statuaries, figurines, Cy Twomblys, and other choice objects in his living room that serve as his muses. Indeed, one detects in his work the subtle calligraphy of Twombly, the alchemy of Beuys, the effervescence of Helen Frankenthaler, the formal classicism of Leonardo de Vinci, the brute allure of Francis Bacon — a conspiracy of elegance chaired by Mr. Rucci. There is about the designer the finely wrought sensibility of James Whistler and the imperial subjectivity of John Singer Sargent.
Walter Pater once decreed "to burn always with this gem-like flame, to maintain this ecstasy, is success in life." Billie Holiday sang, "Nice work if you can get it." Ralph Rucci has unquestionably achieved success, and he is wonderfully at work.
Iké Udé: Why do the practice and exaltation of beauty appear so radical a position today?
Ralph Rucci: If people think like this, it is only out of fear, because mediocrity is the norm; they accept it. They are angered by beauty, fearful of it, because it is so hard to attain. Too many people emphasize sex; I prefer the cerebral. My idea of beauty tends to figurines and broken figures of statuaries. The form is what I feel so stimulating.
IU: Can your work be construed as a crusade against the overwhelming vulgarity and gimmickry of contemporary fashion, especially that of the American fashion world?
RR: Mediocrity on all levels must consistently be argued against. For two decades, I have lost my shirt twice. I am so pleased, honored and humbled that within my collection I attempt to attain perfection; we don't obtain it every season, but we do approach it. Every time we have political elections, the issue of mediocrity becomes so obvious. We are not the majority. But our power as a minority is so much stronger that the huge majority.
IU: What processes inform each of your collections?
TS: I pick up those concepts that were not fully realized from previous collections and begin to work on them. For instance, the relief effect in double-face seaming began in the fall couture in July; by the time we showed the spring ready-to-wear in September, we had evolved it into ready-to-wear: raincoats, hats, skirts, evening dresses. Also my intention now is to use my artwork — almost like an unconscious investigational tool to find new ways of cutting and making clothes.
IU: I find your choice of the word "clothes" odd. You don't really make clothes, do you? People don't buy your work because they simply need to cover up.
RR: I love your point. I make vessels that mirror extraordinary individuals. Eve Orton, who was the fur and fabric editor at Harpers under Diana Vreeland and one of my best friends, said the same thing to me in the early 1980s: You don't make clothes. It is pretentious of me to not consider them clothes, though; you can talk of them in that matter but I cannot. I actually sell these. If they were not worn, they would be something else. That is why I am investigating the artistic variables — why I design couture.
IU: In an interview with aRUDE, the painter Chuck Close remarked that he once restricted himself to a color or non-color palette of black and white, which made him more resourceful. Are you inclined to such discipline?
RR: I have been. My entire career has been the palette of black, white, beige and taupe. Any other color you experience in my work has been an attempt to evolve; to leave it and go on to more. I have been forcing myself to select colors to liberate myself from the comfort of black, white and beige. I can make an entire collection in taupe; it is the shadow and the mystery of the mind's eye. But just because I like taupe, I cannot expect the public to only want taupe; one must think of a variety of people. We have an enormously refined public purchasing the clothes. Halston taught me that super-rich women want color. I don't use color. In fashion, unlike fine art, you have to find a common ground with your client.
We have to allow the fabric to speak and synthetics do not have a wonderful vocabulary.
IU: Your Spring 2005 show had a certain performative, dance theatricality: Pina Bausch came to mind.
RR: I adore Pina Bausch. Do you remember when the concrete wall fell, and the cider blocks and dust went into everyone's faces? Incredible, perfect — that was the performance for me. At that point, I left. In a sense, Muccia Prada is the essence of Pina Bausch — and I'm not talking about her black nylon handbags. I am talking about her exploration into the unusual.
IU: Speaking of Halston…
RR: What a genius! There are companies that still exist today off the Halston technique. He demystified the bias cut. We think of Vionette as the originator and Madame Grés as the experimenter. Halston brought the bias cut into normalcy by using it for everything, from daytime skirts to evening wear. He proved that a designer could have his own retail, made-to-order couture. He refused to use the word couture.
The man running the Halston workroom apprenticed with Balenciaga, so I went there to learn the Balenciaga technique. I was a young upstart; I forced myself into that world. I have notes from that period recording who was there, what they wore, what they said. I would just listen.
This profession doesn't honor anyone. We need to honor our originals, those who have shown us the way like James Gallanos. Elsa Peretti I honor: the most visionary jewelry artist alive today — let alone feminist. Elsa, Halston, Balenciaga were all about the rigor of technique. Not letting go until the armhole is perfect.
IU: Do you use Elsa's work in conjunction with your shows?
RR: I do. The most genius things she ever made: a bicycle clip, now a collector's item. Pure, simple perfection. Drives me out of my mind when I open up daily trade journals and see collections of utter mediocrity receiving rave reviews. Pathetic; it all bespeaks the politics of our industry.
IU: Do you use Elsa's work in conjunction with your shows?
RR: I do. The most genius things she ever made: a bicycle clip, now a collector's item. Pure, simple perfection. Drives me out of my mind when I open up daily trade journals and see collections of utter mediocrity receiving rave reviews. Pathetic; it all bespeaks the politics of our industry.
IU: How do you distinguish Haute Couture from sportswear?
RR: I don't.
IU: The Russian Expressionist painter Wassily Kandinsky wrote about "the spiritual in art." Is there possibly the spiritual in fashion as well?
RR: Yes absolutely. Those who had it: Balenciaga, Charles James, Madame Grés.
IU: Chanel?
RR: Coco Chanel was about the persona more than the clothes.
IU: Do you think she did it deliberately?
RR: Everything about Chanel was deliberate. Everyone loved her because she controlled everything. When she took the understructure out of the jacket after the war, she knew it emancipated women. When she came back, she used her history as her handle.
IU: How much of fashion is advertisement versus substance?
RR: All of it, except for eleven houses.
IU: Globally speaking?
RR: Absolutely!!
IU: What role do extraordinary fabrics play in your collections? Would your overall work suffer immensely without such fabrics?
RR: I would close the door if I had to use synthetics. Rare, luxurious fabrics whisper. Such fabrics help to develop new cuts. Synthetics have no longevity; they are for the moment. For me the most extraordinary fabric is double-face cashmere. We have to allow the fabric to speak and synthetics do not have a wonderful vocabulary.
IU: How do you maintain the overall quality of your work?
RR: Great question. I have my own production workrooms in-house, overseen by the most honorable man I have ever met. His name is Mr. Kim. He has the desire of perfection within his soul.
IU: In your fashion shows, you have a varied age range of models. Is this a commentary about our obsession with the unbearable cult of youth?
RR: I use the girls that touch my heart first. Most often I use models that are known. When they span various age groups, it points to the fact that young has nothing to do with age. What propels us forward is the intelligence of wisdom and age.
IU: Of which collections are you proudest?
RR: I could cry: the very first couture show I had in Paris, a fall collection, which I adored. There was a spring collection in 2000 where I had the models walk around three sculptures from Yves Dana. That collection was incredibly important for my career. They have all been learning steps. The only one collection I was unhappy with — although financially, it was one of our best — was the Spring 2002, which I showed at the Sony music studio. Accidentally the music stopped. The technicians messed up the music; all you could hear was the footsteps and utter silence. Six sets of heels and no sounds. Everyone said the collection was fantastic; they thought I did it on purpose. I freaked out on the technicians. Then, as if by miracle, when Alek Wek stepped on the runway, the music started again. It was metaphysical.
IU: By that you mean…?
RR: Religion is a great part of my life. I pray a great deal. I ask through my prayers to create everything inside me. I don't feel I do this all alone. Christianity is my first religion. The Zen part of it is just the calm.
IU: You deserve comparison to such august talents as Christian Dior, Yves Saint Laurent, Cristobal Balenciaga, Coco Chanel. What accounts for their enduring appeal?
RR: Ruth Montgomery wrote a book called Strangers Amongst Us. The book is about individuals that have come to our planet to show us the direction. These are such individuals.
IU: What do your clothes conceal or reveal about you?
RR: My passion and my desire to meet standards that I create based upon the rigor I desire. Over the past three years the work is beginning to reveal more about me. I am beginning to experiment with the sexual tension, which can coexist with the cerebral.
IU: Some artists take a break, then continue, uninspired. When should one get off-stage?
RR: When I go to Europe to begin work for the next season, I hide. I don't go to parties; I don't feel comfortable doing that. You cannot take a hiatus as a fashion designer; it is perceived as a sign of weakness. You must allow the process to occupy your blood. Once you leave, you cannot come back.
IU: How do you measure success?
RR: Success for me is to be able to live with myself calmly. No one gave me anything. As my business grows, instead of buying a car, I buy art. I am possessed by it. I buy things that stimulate me.
