I like the body. I like to design everything to do with the body.

The great Italian designer Gianni Versace, whose art clothed the world in passion and power, once said: “I like the body. I like to design everything to do with the body.” To the casual ear, these words may sound simple — the statement of a man devoted to fashion. But beneath their simplicity lies a philosophy as ancient as sculpture, as divine as creation itself. For in those few words, Versace revealed that his work was not merely about fabric or glamour, but about reverence — a deep and unashamed celebration of the human body as the living temple of beauty and expression.

To Versace, the body was not something to be hidden or shamed, but to be honored, adorned, and exalted. He saw in its lines and proportions the same perfection that Michelangelo once saw in marble, the same sacred geometry that guided the architects of Greece and Rome. His designs did not fight against the body — they flowed with it, celebrated its movement, its sensuality, its power. Every seam, every curve, every shimmer of his garments was crafted to enhance the human form rather than disguise it. His was not the art of concealment, but of revelation — the revelation of confidence, vitality, and freedom.

This philosophy was born not in the studios of Paris or the runways of Milan, but in the Mediterranean world that raised him. The Italy of Versace was a land of sunlight and stone, of ancient statues and mythic heroes. The Greeks and Romans before him had carved gods in human form — Apollo, Aphrodite, Hercules — for they believed that divinity itself could be seen through the perfection of the body. To Versace, this tradition lived on: his fashion was a continuation of that ancient dialogue between flesh and art, between the mortal and the divine. To design for the body was, for him, an act of worship — an acknowledgment that the human form is the original masterpiece of creation.

His words also carry a defiance against the cold detachment that often enters the world of design. In an age where technology and abstraction can pull art away from humanity, Versace’s voice called us back to the physical, to the tangible, to the warmth of skin and movement. He believed that design must serve the living being — not an idea, not an ideal, but the real person within the fabric. In this way, he restored the body to its rightful place at the center of artistic creation. He reminded the world that to love design is to love life itself, for the body is where life is felt, expressed, and seen.

There is a story told of how Gianni Versace, when asked what inspired him most, pointed not to museums or machines, but to people — to dancers, athletes, lovers, and dreamers. He admired the grace of movement, the way muscles spoke without words, the poetry that lives in the turn of a shoulder or the arc of a stride. His fashion shows were not static displays of clothing, but living theater — bold, sensual, and human. He once said that his designs were meant to make people feel strong, as though wearing them gave power to the spirit through the form. In this way, his love for the body became a love for confidence, for individuality, for the radiant joy of being alive.

In his reverence for the body, Versace also taught a deeper lesson — that self-expression is not vanity, but vitality. To adorn oneself is not to worship appearance, but to celebrate existence. The body is not an enemy to the soul; it is its vessel, its instrument, its visible reflection. Just as the ancients painted warriors with golden armor and priests with sacred robes to reflect their inner might, so too did Versace dress men and women to express the divinity within them. His artistry was a call to self-acceptance — to see one’s body not as a flaw to be corrected, but as a canvas for the light of personality and courage.

Thus, my listener of the future, take these words of Gianni Versace as both inspiration and invitation: “I like the body. I like to design everything to do with the body.” Do not fear your own form; do not hide from it. Instead, honor it — through how you move, how you live, how you dress, and how you carry yourself through the world. Whatever you create — whether in art, work, or life — let it be connected to the living pulse of humanity. Let your designs, your ideas, your actions serve the body and the soul together, as Versace’s did.

For the body is not mere flesh — it is the expression of life itself, the bridge between the seen and unseen, the stage upon which the spirit dances. To celebrate it, as Versace did, is to affirm that creation is not something distant or divine, but something already present within us all. And when we learn, as he did, to see beauty in the living form — to design everything to do with the body — we rediscover the oldest truth of all: that to honor the body is to honor the miracle of being human.