Cameron Silver: "Well, when we first opened in Dover, our first customer was Yoko Ono. That should give you an idea of how crazy it is in London. There's no price resistance, because it's so expensive that you have to be rich to live there. In London, people never want to borrow because they can buy. It's women in their 40s, 50s and 60s who can buy anything, so they want exclusive stuff. They can practically get a fur coat for what it costs for two to go to dinner. I can't go into Starbucks in London without spending $40. I can't even afford to visit the boutique much, which means right now I'm looking a lot like a 75-year-old Florida woman, or an overgrown tween."

Rick Owens: Friend! Every morning I wake up and watch the snowboarding competitions on the Extreme Sports Channel. The clothes have become as voluminous, sculptural and colorful as Kabuki costumes, not to mention the masks, helmets and gloves. And the manmade snow racecourses rival the most sophisticated earthworks of the art world. Young strong bodies hurling themselves off of them into space and twisting and spinning as they fall—it's heroic, flamboyant and inspirational. As for me, I've snowboarded in the past, but I'm too low-blood-pressured to be any good. I lost my recklessness and sense of invincibility years ago. It was only when I moved to Paris that I started watching these races. I never had cable before!

Stephen Gan: You get a glimpse of it mostly from the work, the images of visionary photographers and designers. You get a feeling of, as the old saying goes, the shock of the new. And that makes you think, hmmmm, this is where things are headed. Also, you get a hunch, and you think this artist, photographer, designer, model could be the Next Big Thing. You don't know why, it's just a feeling. Sadly, I don't think that feeling happens as often as we would like. We live for it but, alas, it doesn't happen every day.

Katie Grand: I don't think anyone can escape the huge influence the new weekly gossip magazines have had on publishing. In Britain, 'Bizarre' in the Sun used to be the only source of tabloid gossip, but now newsstands are full of magazines with their own tabloid-style slants, merging women's issues, men's issues, celebrity, sex, diets, fashion and sleaze. The cool magazines have also had to keep their fingers in the proverbial pie, providing their own twists on the hottest couple, celebrity makeovers and the essential "story." Everyone, from Joe Public to celebrities, fashion folk and art types, is obsessed with the weeklies. It's been said magazines are dead, yet these mags are selling half a million copies a week. It's a phenomenon I don't think anyone could really see coming.

Julie Gilhart: Holiday shopping is not a wholesome tradition unless you are baking your gifts, while shameless flogging should only be exercised if you are willing to get arrested. So I think holiday shopping should be approached from a state of need. Buy only what you need, give to others what you think they need. And most importantly, never, ever forget those in need. As for me, just a little mistletoe will do.

Rei Kawakubo: I don't need any particular process or action. I need to be in a situation where there are no obligations or restraints. That is the right condition for being able to make new things and for image creation. In this environment, and with a will and a constantly searching "eye," creation arises from everyday ordinary life.

Raf Simons: It's easier in Belgium to set up a business. Rents are very low and the quality of life is very high. It's not too expensive a country for forming ateliers, not compared to New York or London. As a result, Belgian designers can be very experimental. They come from a small country, so they want to prove themselves. I think that's a very Belgian thing. When I started, I was looking at Belgium examples, like Dries [Van Noten], Ann [Demeulemeester] and others in the Antwerp Six. They were very involved in protecting their independence and doing their own thing. But the first five years were very hard for me. I was completely independent and very naive. I didn't really know how to build a company. Now, after restructuring my business, I'm thinking about clothes more. And I’m very focused on the future.

Gwen Stefani: It's a very self-obsessed side project...well, I wouldn't even call it a side project anymore...a project that I've fantasized about that I'm now deep into, a line of everyday funky clothes that I want everyone to be jealous of. It's about finding another passion in my life that I can be good at years and years from now. I want to have something that is alive, a brand that grows, that has its own signature. That's the goal. I'm not planning to be bouncing around on stage for the rest of my life. But I have to fulfill my creative urges somehow and fashion design is a way I can do it.

Oscar de la Renta: The customer I started dressing back in 1965 is very different from the woman of today. Today's woman has very different needs. Her first preoccupation of the day is not to get dressed in a pretty suit and have lunch with friends. The only very frivolous thing a woman will do on a daily basis, if you want to call it frivolous, is look in the mirror and think "Do I look okay?" My job is to understand who she is. I simply try to make collections that address that moment. I think that is what has made our business successful.

Harold Koda: Very much. Born in a time when the voluptuous ideal of the femme fatale reigned, Chanel, slight and athletic, was often said to have the fine-boned compactness of a jockey. Self-confident, she prioritized a sense of physical ease in her designs. Her chemises of the 1920s and her dresses with plunging back necklines in the 1930s precluded women with full bosoms from being the height of chic. Her evening dresses have the near-naked weightlessness of lingerie and are made of fabrics of the boudoir, such as tulle, lace, satin and chiffon. The seductive power of a woman in a Chanel gown, even if modestly cut, resides in the garment's seemingly insubstantial drift over the body. Even her signature wool tweeds are airily woven, requiring quilted silk linings to prevent bagging and flattened gilt chains to balance their hems. Like Chanel herself, the designs, though they cleave to a functional modernism, are always about feminine allure.

Stephen Jones: Yes, from Abe Lincoln to 50 Cent, Billie Holiday to Dita von Teese. Need I say more? Well, yes I do. Like America itself, hats enable you to re-invent yourself into the person you dream to be, not the person you are. Also, to wear a hat well requires a certain amount of fuck-you fearlessness, which is why Americans look so convincing in hats. My favorite American hat? If Adrian said that gingham was the sable of America, then I say the baseball cap is its tiara.

Glenda Bailey: Style is only torture for those who are tortured by the fact that they have none. When in doubt, think Kay Thompson, who channeled Diana Vreeland in Funny Face: "On how to be lovely, you've got to be carefree." Great style is in one's nature but it doesn't hurt to be nurtured by someone with well-stocked closets.

 Shoptart
While Camelot is over for Olivier Theyskens, it isn't stopping Nina Ricci from showing some First Lady love by relaunching their famous Jackie O sunglasses. Also this month: Paul Smith, Mi Concept, Isabel Marant, Zero + Maria Cornejo and more.