想躲在貓身後的老佛爺拉格菲爾德

Karl Lagerfeld, arguably the most recognizable fashion designer in the world, is in a back office at Fendi’s headquarters on the Via Solari, receiving from an assistant a gift someone has sent for his Birman, Choupette.

卡爾·拉格菲爾德(Karl Lagerfeld)可以說是世界上辨識度最高的時裝設計師。在索拉里街芬迪(Fendi)總部後面一個辦公室裏，助手把別人送給他的伯曼貓舒佩特(Choupette)的禮物交給他。

“I have a famous cat,” said Mr. Lagerfeld, glancing over the cat-printed notepads offered to him and Choupette. (She has more than 46,000 fans on the Twitter account invented in her honor, turns up frequently in the pages of fashion magazines and has inspired a line of makeup by Shu Uemura.) Mr. Lagerfeld said he hoped the cat would become more famous than him. “Then I can disappear behind Choupette,” he said.

“我有一隻著名的貓，”拉格菲爾德說。他瞟了一眼送給他和舒佩特的貓咪印花平板電腦（以舒佩特的名義開設的Twitter賬戶有46000多名粉絲；它經常出現在時尚雜誌上；植村秀以它爲靈感設計了一套彩妝）。拉格菲爾德說，他希望這隻貓能變得比自己更出名。“那樣，我就能消失在舒佩特背後了，”他說。

Few things could be less likely. Mr. Lagerfeld is an object of public fascination in the Selfie Age, too recognizable to walk the streets or attend a party without incident.

這幾乎是不可能的。在自拍時代，拉格菲爾德是公衆癡迷的對象，他太好認了，無論走在大街上還是參加派對，都會造成轟動。

Now in his 70s (or 80s, depending on the source) — and more éminence blanc, thanks to his powdered ponytail, than éminence grise — the German-born designer remains as prolific as he is tenacious, with a terse wit and a predilection for Delphic pronouncements.

拉格菲爾德出生於德國。花白的馬尾讓他看起來更像白衣主教，而非灰衣主教。如今他70多歲（也可能是80多歲，對此說法不一），卻依然多產而堅韌，具有言簡意賅的機智，偏愛神諭般的宣言。

“There are not too many people with an opinion I care for,” he said. His own he dispenses liberally, and from them, nothing is safe.

“現在，我只在乎少數幾個人的觀點，”他說。他自己倒是不吝於發表觀點，什麼都可能成爲他的批評對象。

One assistant at Fendi years ago even found himself rechristened when Mr. Lagerfeld deemed his actual surname, Peugnet, cumbersome and provincial. “I said, ‘Hervé, this name is not possible, it’s too heavy,’ ” Mr. Lagerfeld said. The assistant eventually left to found his own line, and the world came to know him, as Mr. Lagerfeld did, as Hervé Léger, from the French word for “light.”

多年前，芬迪公司的一名助理甚至發現自己有了新名字，因爲拉格菲爾德覺得他的本姓珀涅(Peugnet)又拗口又土氣。“我對他說，‘埃爾韋，這個姓太難唸了，太沉重了，’”拉格菲爾德說。這位助理最終離開，創立了自己的服裝品牌，以埃爾韋·萊熱(Hervé Léger)爲世人所知 ，萊熱這個姓是拉格菲爾德給他取的，在法語中的意思是“光”。

During an interview last week, Mr. Lagerfeld opined on a range of subjects, including his preference for working with women (“I’m not crazy to discuss fashion with men. I couldn’t care less about their opinion.”); his desire to die the way Coco Chanel did, while in the middle of creating a collection; and his aversion to stress. (“I don’t believe in it. It’s a job, one should not become hysterical.”)

在上週的採訪中，拉格菲爾德對各種事情發表了意見，包括他更喜歡跟女人一起工作（“我不太喜歡跟男人討論時裝。我根本不在乎他們的看法”）；他渴望像可可·香奈兒(Coco Chanel)那樣，在設計一個服裝系列的過程中死去；他厭惡壓力（“我不相信壓力能帶來益處。這只是工作，不應該把人變得歇斯底里”）。

It’s hard to envision Mr. Lagerfeld hysterical. He delivers even the most pointed of his gravelly barbs with a composure unlikely to ruffle his starched collar or muss his Dior Homme suit.

很難想像拉格菲爾德歇斯底里的樣子。哪怕是聲音沙啞地說出最尖刻的冷嘲熱諷，他依然沉着鎮定，絕不會弄皺上過漿的衣領或身上的迪奧桀傲(Dior Homme)西服。

But, in his case, a little stress may be understandable. In addition to designing several collections a year each for Fendi, Chanel and his own Karl Lagerfeld line, he announced last week that he would add a show of haute fourrure, or “couture fur,” for fur-centric Fendi during the Paris couture collections in July.

不過，就他的情況而言，有點壓力也是可以理解的。除了每年要分別給芬迪、香奈兒和他自己的卡爾·拉格菲爾德品牌設計幾個系列之外，上週他宣佈將在7月份的巴黎高級定製時裝週上爲以皮草爲重的芬迪增加一場高級皮草秀。

The occasion will signify his 50th anniversary as designer for the Roman label, the longest-ever partnership between a designer and a luxury maison, as well as the first time in the history of the Fédération Française de la Couture that a single designer has staged both an haute couture and an haute fourrure show in a single season. (This conversation was condensed and edited.)

這場時裝秀將標誌着他擔任該羅馬品牌設計師50週年，這是設計師與奢侈品公司之間爲時最長的合作，也是法國時裝協會(Fédération Française de la Couture)歷史上首次出現單個設計師在一季同時舉辦高級定製時裝秀和高級皮草秀（以下對話經過剪輯和濃縮）。

Q. The haute fourrure collection will mark your 50th year at Fendi, but I’m told you don’t like the word “anniversary” — you don’t like looking back.

問：高級皮草系列將標誌着你在芬迪的50週年，但是我聽說你不喜歡“週年”這個詞，你不喜歡回顧過去。

A. No, no, no, no. This is one of the sicknesses of our period, to look back. No, forget about it. Fashion is now and tomorrow. Who cares about the past? But at Fendi, they like to tour the past.

答：是的，我很不喜歡。回顧過去是我們這個時代的弊病之一。忘了它吧。時裝是關於現在和明天的。誰在乎過去？但是在芬迪，人們喜歡回顧過去。

So maybe call it a celebration, rather than an anniversary?

問：所以，也許我們不要稱它爲週年，而稱爲慶祝。

It’s not a celebration. It’s a new start. In the past, Fendi did only fur. Then they started to do ready-to-wear and funny fur [i.e., faux fur], but this was 40 years ago. Now, it’s time to do the highest level of couture fourrure. But better to do it during haute couture because it’s the right place to show it to the right people. That’s a very simple idea. It’s nothing going back to any roots. It’s planting new trees.

答：它不是慶祝，而是一個新的開始。過去，芬迪只做皮草。然後，他們開始做成衣和人造皮草，但那是40年前。現在，該做最高水平的高級皮草了。不過最好是在高級定製時裝週舉辦，因爲那裏有你的目標客戶。這很好理解。它絕不是追溯起源。它是培植新樹。

Fifty years is a very long time to be with a company. Do you ever reflect over the long term of your career at Fendi?

問：在一個公司工作50年真的很長。你有沒有反思過在芬迪的長期事業？

No. Never.

答：沒有，從來沒有。

Is that the secret to longevity?

問：那是永葆青春的祕密嗎？

I don’t take ideas from my own past. Sometimes I see things [and say], “Oh, it’s not that bad.” And people tell me, “You did that 20 or 30 years ago.” Maybe — I forgot. As long as you’re in the business, you must not think about your own work. In Germany, they made a huge exhibition of everything I did, Fendi, Chanel, Lagerfeld, Chloé and all that. I’m not even going to the show. I don’t care.

答：我從不借鑑自己過去的作品。有時我看到某些東西，會說：“哦，這個還不錯。”人們對我說，“那是你二三十年前的作品。”也許是吧，我忘了。只要你還在時尚界工作，你就不該去想自己的作品。他們在德國舉辦了一個大型展覽，展示我爲芬迪、香奈兒、拉格菲爾德和寇依(Chloé)等品牌設計的所有作品。我甚至不會去看那場展覽。我不在乎。

You don’t feel the weight of all that history behind you?

問：你沒有感到自己身後所有這些歷史的份量嗎？

There’s no history. I don’t even have archives, myself. I keep nothing. What I like is to do — not the fact that I did. It doesn’t excite me at all. When people start to think that what they did in the past is perhaps even better than what they do now, they should stop. Lots of my colleagues, they have archives, they look at their dresses like they were Rembrandts! Please, forget about it.

答：沒什麼歷史。我自己甚至沒有檔案。我什麼都不保存。我喜歡的是“去做”，而不是“我做過”。後者一點也不讓我感到興奮。如果人們開始覺得自己過去做的也許比現在做得還好，那麼他們應該停止。我的很多同行保存檔案，他們看着自己設計的衣服，感覺自己像倫勃朗！請忘了它吧。

How did the idea come about to do haute fourrure?

問：做高級皮草的想法是如何產生的？

I don’t remember where the idea comes from. Maybe it’s me. I think the idea is right. The problem with fur. … For me, as long as people eat meat and wear leather, I don’t get the message. It’s very easy to say no fur, no fur, no fur, but it’s an industry. Who will pay for all the unemployment of the people if you suppress the industry of the fur? The hunters in the north for the sable, they have no other job, there is nothing else to do. Those organizations who are much against it, they are not Bill Gates.

答：我不記得這個想法是從哪兒來的。也許是我想出來的。我覺得這是個好主意。皮草的問題……在我看來，只要人們吃肉、穿皮革，我就不能理解爲什麼要反對皮草。聲稱反對皮草太容易了，但它是一個產業。如果你壓制皮草業，那麼誰來賠償因此失業的人呢？北方狩獵黑貂的獵人沒別的工作，沒別的事可做。那些強烈反對皮草的組織，他們不是比爾·蓋茨(Bill Gates)。

So you’re not very sympathetic to the anti-fur cause?

問：所以，你不是太同情反皮草事業？

I’m very sympathetic. I hate the idea of killing animals in a horrible way, but I think all that improved a lot. I think a butcher shop is even worse. It’s like visiting a murder. It’s horrible, no? So I prefer not to know it.

答：我很同情。我憎惡用兇殘的方式屠殺動物，但我覺得情況普遍改善了很多。我覺得肉店更糟糕。去肉店就像去見兇手。很可怕，不是嗎？所以，我寧願不去了解它。

Does fur ever feel like a limitation?

問：你是否曾經覺得皮草有侷限性？

No. You have to find new ways to use something that could be considered limited in the way you could use it. That’s part of the job. I know the technique, I know the materials. I haven’t used some of them for quite a long time. So it’s fun to use it again to do something I haven’t done with them before. I hope I have enough ideas that I can make something new out of that.

答：沒有。你必須找到新的方法來使用某種可能被認爲有侷限性的東西。這是設計師工作的一部分。我懂技術，瞭解各種材料。有些材料我很久沒用過了。所以，再次用它做一些之前沒做過的東西很有意思。我希望自己能想出足夠多的辦法，做點新東西出來。

Do you worry about not having enough ideas? I wouldn’t expect so.

問：你擔心自己的想法不夠多嗎？我沒想到你會有這種擔心。

No, no, no. I don’t believe in waiting for inspiration. The French say, l’appétit vient en mangeant, the ideas come when you work. I work a lot for the garbage can. I have huge bins next [to me], for whatever I do, 95 percent goes to the bin.

答：不是，不是，不是。我不相信靈感能等來。法國人常說，靈感是在工作中產生的。我做的很多東西都丟到了垃圾桶裏。我身邊有好幾個大垃圾桶，不管我做什麼，95%的東西都到了垃圾桶裏。

It’s like Einstein apparently said: 99 percent perspiration, 1 percent inspiration.

問：就像愛因斯坦說的：99%的汗水，1%的靈感。

He was very funny and very clever, even if my brain is not exactly his. He was pretty right. You know, Einstein had a huge sense of humor.

答：他非常風趣，非常聰明，儘管我的大腦跟他的不太一樣。他說得很對。你知道，愛因斯坦很有幽默感。

Do you have a good sense of humor?

問：你很有幽默感嗎？

I hope so.

答：我希望如此。

Is there a place for humor in fashion?

問：幽默在時尚界重要嗎？

I don’t think that most of the designers have a very quick sense of humor. They take themselves very seriously because they want to be taken as artists. I think we are artisans. It’s an applied art. There’s nothing bad about that. If you want to do art, then show it in a gallery.

答：我覺得大部分設計師不是太有幽默感。他們把自己看得非常重要，因爲他們想讓別人把自己看做藝術家。我覺得我們是手工藝人。服裝是應用藝術。這沒什麼不好。如果你想搞藝術，那麼你去畫廊展示它。

So you don’t consider yourself an artist?

問：所以你不認爲自己是藝術家？

No, no, no, no. I’m a designer, I do photos, I do books, I’m a publisher, but I don’t have the self-proclaimed label “artist.” I hate that. Very pretentious. If other people say it, it’s very flattering, but if you start to say it yourself, you better forget about it.

答：不，不，不，不。我是設計師，我也攝影，寫書，搞出版，但我不自稱“藝術家”。我很不喜歡那個稱呼。非常自命不凡。如果別人這麼說，那是在恭維，但如果你開始這樣自稱，那麼你最好還是忘了它吧。

Speaking of photography: You shoot the Fendi campaigns, the Chanel campaigns, even some Dior Homme campaigns, and for magazines. Why? Is it a pleasure, or just a different type of work?

問：說起攝影，你給芬迪、香奈兒，甚至迪奧桀傲拍過廣告，還給雜誌拍過照片。爲什麼呢？是因爲喜歡，還是說它只是另一種工作？

If it was not a pleasure, I wouldn’t do it. Second, it’s quite important. If you do only collections, you end up in an ivory tower. You finish the collection and you are isolated until the time to get to the next one. That would be very boring. It’s very bad and unhealthy to get isolated. Already I don’t walk in the street, so I have to do something, somewhere.

答：如果不是因爲喜歡，我就不會做了。另外，它也很重要。如果只設計服裝，你會只停留在象牙塔內。你完成一個系列，就與世隔絕，直到開始下一個系列。那會非常枯燥。與世隔絕很糟糕，不健康。我已經不在大街上行走了，所以我必須在其他地方做點什麼。

You don’t walk in the street because you’re too famous now? People stop you?

問：你不在大街上行走是因爲你現在太出名了嗎？人們會攔住你？

Exactly, all over the world. We live in the world of selfies.

答：正是如此，在世界各地都是這樣。我們生活在一個自拍的世界裏。

Do you like selfies?

問：你喜歡自拍嗎？

I don’t do selfies. But other people do, and they all want to do selfies with me. No, no, no. Thank God, Sébastien, my assistant, he’s mean to the people in the street, mean and rude. I’m a nice person.

答：我不自拍。但是其他人自拍，他們都想和我自拍。不，不，不。多虧了我的助理塞巴斯蒂安(Sébastien)，他對街上的人很刻薄，刻薄而粗魯。這樣我就可以和和氣氣的。

Do you keep an eye on the work of other designers, your competitors?

問：你留意其他設計師、你的競爭對手的作品嗎？

Yes, I look at many things. I don’t see it like competition. I like when there are many people who do good things, because you work better if there is competition than if there are only third-rate people. Paris cannot be Paris only with one. But from me to you, there are very few who have, in terms of craftsmanship, the craftsmanship of high-quality couture. For me, the best — I won’t talk about Chanel, because they have the biggest operation, with 250 workers for the whole couture — is Dior and Givenchy. The others, I prefer not to comment. I am not a fashion journalist.

答：是的，我看很多東西。我不把它視爲競爭。我喜歡很多人設計出很好的作品，因爲你在有競爭的情況下做得更好，好過在其他設計師都是三流水平的情況下。如果只有一位優秀設計師，那巴黎就稱不上巴黎了。但是，坦白跟你說，從工藝水平角度講，沒幾個人能做出高質量的定製服裝。在我看來，最好的是迪奧和紀梵希(Givenchy)。香奈兒我就不說了，因爲它的運作團隊最大，有250人爲整個高級定製服裝工作。其他品牌我不想評論。我不是時裝記者。

Have you begun to work on the haute fourrure?

問：你開始設計高級皮草系列了嗎？

It’s working in my mind, but now I have to get rid of the season of the ready-to-wear, so I have to do Fendi, then Chanel, then we have to do the cruise, then we have to do this. ...

答：我頭腦中有了些構思，但現在我得先解決成衣季，所以我得先完成芬迪和香奈兒的成衣系列，然後我們得設計度假系列，然後才能做這個……

Is it difficult to design for so many labels?

問：給這麼多品牌做設計有困難嗎？

When I’m at Fendi, I don’t even remember what I am doing somewhere else, and if I am somewhere else, I forgot what I did here. What I do for Chanel never looks like Fendi. I have no personality. Perhaps I have three.

答：在芬迪時，我甚至不記得我在其他地方在做什麼。如果在其他地方，我會忘記在芬迪做的東西。我給香奈兒設計的東西看起來永遠不像芬迪。我沒有個性。或者說，我有三重個性。

Do you foresee a time when you might stop?

問：你想過將來有一天會停止設計嗎？

No. I would die on the spot. Chanel died in the middle of a collection when she was in her nearly 90s. I have time! In fashion, you think about six months, six months, six months. Now it’s even three months, three months, three months. The world is different. There’s no faraway future, it’s no futuristic thing. Fashion is something people are supposed to consume immediately, not in 10 years.

答：沒有。我會在工作崗位上死去。香奈兒90多歲時在設計某個系列時去世。我還有時間！時裝界想問題都是以半年爲界。現在甚至是以三個月爲界。這世界變了。沒有遙遠的未來，也沒有未來主義這回事。時裝是希望人們馬上消費的東西，而不是十年以後。