That was when I first observed a phenomenon I now call the "New York Slide": you offer your words to try to communicate and connect with someone, but your words just hit a brick wall the person has erected to ward off human contact- the words slide down it and roll away.

Society has a hyper emphasis on thin, and that trend comes from the consumers - it does not come from the fashion industry. The fashion industry needs to make money; that's what we do. If people said, 'We want a 300 pound purple person,' the first industry to do it would be fashion.

People should just express themselves and not worry about trends - try to use fashion like a compass, an indicator, examples of things that you can be. It's not to be taken so seriously. It's just clothes.

If people decide thin is out, the fashion industry won't have thin models anymore. Have you spent time with fashion people? They are ruthless. They want money. And the one thing they know is people want clothes to cover their bodies. Unfortunately, most people aren't comfortable with their bodies.

Social media, especially Twitter, has completely changed the fashion and media industries - we now can go direct to consumers in a nanosecond - amazing way of distributing content - right to the point.