In terms of design, it's true the world has an influence. But, as

Hear now, O seeker of truth and creation, the words of Nicolas Ghesquière, the visionary architect of modern fashion, who declared: “In terms of design, it’s true the world has an influence. But, as a designer, you have to protect yourself. You have to look at the world and then forget it.” In this utterance lies the timeless paradox of the creator’s path — that one must see deeply into the world, absorb its light and shadow, and yet not become enslaved by it. For though the world feeds inspiration, it also threatens to consume it; though influence can awaken genius, it can also drown it in imitation. Thus, Ghesquière speaks not merely to designers, but to all who strive to make something original and pure in a world that never stops whispering in their ears.

Nicolas Ghesquière, born in France, rose to prominence as the daring and imaginative creative director of Balenciaga, and later of Louis Vuitton, where he redefined what it means to merge history with modernity. His designs carried echoes of the past — the structure of Cristóbal Balenciaga, the discipline of couture — yet his vision was unmistakably his own: futuristic, sculptural, almost otherworldly. It is from this deep struggle between influence and individuality that his words were born. He had seen how the world’s constant noise — trends, critics, commerce — can corrupt the clarity of the artist’s inner voice. To “look at the world and then forget it” is his creed, his shield, and his compass.

To “look at the world” is to open one’s soul to its richness — to see the play of colors in a sunset, the curve of a building, the sorrow in a face, the rhythm of a city. The designer, like the poet, must observe and listen, for the world is a vast library of forms and emotions. Yet once he has seen, he must forget — not in ignorance, but in wisdom. To forget is to distill, to strip away the excess until only the essence remains. It is to transform observation into creation, influence into insight. For if the artist clings too tightly to what he has seen, he becomes a mirror; but if he lets it pass through him, he becomes a light.

The ancients knew this balance well. The philosopher Plotinus, when speaking of art, said that the sculptor must “cut away all that is excessive” until the form of truth emerges. So too must the modern creator protect the sacred space within, where ideas are not borrowed but born. To “look and forget” is to purify the act of making — to see the world as nourishment, not as prison. The painter Claude Monet, for example, looked at nature with endless devotion, yet when he painted his lilies or his gardens, he did not copy what was before him; he painted what the eye of his soul remembered. The world inspired him — but it did not dictate to him.

And yet, Ghesquière’s words carry a warning as well as a teaching. In an age where the world screams louder than ever — through media, trends, and the hunger for novelty — the artist’s solitude becomes an act of rebellion. To “protect yourself” is not to withdraw from the world in arrogance, but to guard your inner sanctuary, that fragile place where your truest ideas are born. Many lose this battle; they become reflections of the world’s noise, their originality diluted by the demand to please or to fit in. Ghesquière’s wisdom is the voice of resistance — the reminder that the artist’s greatest duty is not to follow the world, but to reinterpret it.

Consider the story of Vincent van Gogh, who saw the same fields, stars, and people as others did, but who painted them through the fire of his own vision. The world influenced him deeply — he felt it, loved it, suffered it — yet his art was not a copy of what his eyes saw. It was what his spirit remembered and transformed. He looked, and then he forgot, and in that forgetting he found eternity. From his solitude and pain emerged works that pulse still with the electricity of truth. This is the same spirit that Ghesquière invokes — the courage to absorb the world without being conquered by it.

So take this lesson into your own heart, O creator of ideas and dreams: see the world, but do not serve it. Walk among its colors and sounds, but do not be trapped by its fashions. Let your imagination be like the sea — fed by a thousand rivers, yet still its own boundless depth. Protect the silence within you, for that silence is the birthplace of originality. Inspiration is the seed, but solitude is the soil.

And thus, as Nicolas Ghesquière teaches, creation is both an act of openness and of defense. The world must be seen, yes — but then transcended. You must learn to look, and then to forget, so that what remains is not the echo of others, but the sound of your own soul. For in that sacred forgetting lies the secret of all great art — the power to transform what is seen into what has never been seen before.