Imagining New York City without Michael Kors is nearly impossible. For more than four decades, he’s woven himself into the city’s sartorial DNA, shaping not only the way Manhattan dresses, but the way it dreams. From his Fifth Avenue flagship to larger-than-life campaigns illuminating Times Square—and instantly recognizable pieces that have become wardrobe staples worldwide—Kors has transformed a fashion label into a New York state of mind. Here, the designer sits down with photography duo and longtime V family members Inez van Lamsweerde & Vinoodh Matadin to discuss timeless style and building a universe that never goes out of fashion.

MICHAEL KORS: This is so much fun. I love that we’re doing this.

INEZ VAN LAMSWEERDE: This is adorable and so cute. When I think of you, I see someone who is obsessed with making women feel amazing.

VINOODH MATADIN: It’s also because you’re so generous!

IVL: You actually are in the business of making women look and feel incredible, and that’s always been the case. You actually care more about the woman, her life, and her personality than whether she’s wearing a red shoe or a blue one. I do think that’s why your career and brand are so unbelievably successful, because it’s completely linked to your philosophy of how you think of women. When I describe you to people who don’t know you, that is what we always say because there are very few people who aren’t driven by ego or by pure creativity. It’s really more of a service you offer to women. Obviously it’s the most glamorous parts of the world, but you’re more so in service to the people that buy your clothes, rather than saying, “I need to lay my creative egg.” Is that correct?

MK: You are more than correct. You know, I think it’s funny—you both have a very creative only child [Charles Matadin], so you’ll understand this analogy. I grew up [in a time] where I was always around adults as an only child, and with a family that treated me like I was one of the adults. There was something about me when I was growing up, and it’s still there today: I’m always observing and watching people. It’s a rush to me that New York never lets me down. From the people-watching perspective, I think I’ve always been this observer, learning what it is that makes someone project themselves a certain way.

IVL: It’s all about the projection.

MK: I always say everyone makes a choice [about how they look]. So when people say they’re not interested in fashion, then I’m like, well, even if you say you’re not interested, you still made a choice today when you got dressed. I know it sounds crazy, but I used to love those makeover shows where they take someone and turn them into a new person. They cut your hair, they change your eyebrows, they put the right color on you, the right shoes. Suddenly you see someone look in the mirror and they stand differently. So I’m still of the firm belief that if you take someone who maybe isn’t having their best day, my job ultimately is to make them look like they are ready to take on the world. If someone is already confident, I want them to be even more confident. I am a realistic optimist. I don’t think fashion is going to change the world’s problems. But at the same time, I do think people can put something on and it can make them feel emboldened, stronger.

IVL & VM: Agreed! 

MK: The coolest thing that ever happened to me was when I was at an event back in 2016 at the White House, and the Obamas were leaving. It was January, and I saw Nancy Pelosi there, and everyone said, “Oh, what are we going to do? Woe is me!” And she looked at me and said, “We have to organize. We can’t agonize.” I had just seen a photograph of her wearing a Michael Kors bright fuchsia dress. It looked unlike anything I had ever seen her wear. It was not what she would normally be in, so I said to her, “You know, I saw that dress on you, and I loved it, but it didn’t seem like something you would choose.” And she said to me, “Well, I got the dress and wore it to an event, and someone was sitting next to me at lunch, and said, ‘You’re already the strongest, smartest, most powerful woman I know. But in that dress, you look even stronger, more powerful and smarter.’ So now, every time I want that extra burst of confidence, I put that Michael Kors dress on.”

IVL: That’s exactly true. When we shoot with you for the campaigns, we hear this kind of story from you all the time. The [on-set] team and everyone around us always looks at us like, “How do you concentrate? Michael is talking to you all the time,” but this is how you’re constantly living. There is story after story of these amazing moments that you relive by retelling them, and that’s how we spend the day with you every time we shoot. It’s so beautiful to always hear you have these incredible new stories, enthusiastic about the latest thing that happened, or the thing that happened in 1994. 

VM: All these stories create images in our brain, and that helps us take the picture, too. That’s how it works with us.

MK: I always say there are layers to life, you know? It’s like when you walk into someone’s home, and you see something in their space; there are these stories and moments that happen to you as a creative person. As a person, I think you have to be aware of what’s happening in the world. All of this might have happened to me, but I’m still the observer. I’m recording it all. The whole process of designing a collection, when it starts from nothing, it’s like making a cake. You think to yourself, “I’m not a scientist, so I have no idea how flour, sugar, eggs, and butter turn into a cake.” We start the process of a collection, and then it comes to life in a fashion show, and then the fashion show can sometimes be transient. But then I think when we’re working with you both in the studio, this is where we cement it. We cement the story that we’re telling, but then the story continues, which is the coolest thing. Not only when the customer actually buys it, but five years after she buys it, she’s still wearing it. That’s when I know we all did our job really well because we hopefully gave her something that’s going to make her feel great, but then we also gave her imagery that she looks at and somehow it cuts into her core. 

IVL: Yeah, it has to!

MK: It does. You look [at the campaigns], and you see yourself. I remember years ago. You’ll appreciate this: we had a fashion show, where every look was super short—like the shortest skirts in the world, they were all barely 12 inches long. My mom arrived in New York from Los Angeles, and she said, “Let me see the mood board for the show,” and I said, “No, you can’t see it.” She said, “What do you mean?” I said, “You’re not going to like this show. It’s just not for you.” So the show happened, and as soon as the show was over, she looked at me, and she said, “I can’t wear any of it, but I want to wear all of it.”

IVL: There you go, that’s the magic—that’s it. 

MK: It’s the same when we create an image with you—like someone sitting and eating a bag of Lay’s potato chips on an airplane in an evening gown. Maybe you would never do that, but you say to yourself, “I really wish I could.”

IVL: At the same time, what I appreciate so much about you, and again, this is another thing we tell our friends when they ask about you: you are the only major luxury designer that actually does trunk shows, right?

MK: Probably. Here’s the thing: isolation is not good for creativity. It’s the worst thing! If you surround yourself with only your team and you’re not part of the world, you’ll get frozen. I’ll admit—it’s the New York disease. It’s why I’m such a New Yorker; I have terrible FOMO. The fear of missing out is constant for me. So I need to see it right away. I mean, this morning I was like, I said, “Oh, we have 20 minutes, and I haven’t seen the Warhol Polaroids at the Whitney.” So we ran over to the Whitney to see the Polaroids.

IVL: They’re amazing!

MK: They were amazing, and I think going to a trunk show or doing a personal appearance in a store—for a designer—it takes the abstraction away from what you’re doing when suddenly you see someone try it on. You know the coolest thing: this campaign we’re shooting with you guys, we shot women who were 4’11 and someone who’s 77 years old. The simple truth: that’s when you know you did your job well. Let’s be frank. It’s no challenge to take a 25-year-old who’s a beanpole with a magnificent face and make them look glorious—anything goes, you know? I’m always interested in the trunk show because it sort of holds a mirror up to what’s happening in the world. Because women are going to tell you very upfront. They’re going to say, ‘You know what? I love that, but I have nowhere to go in it’ or ‘I wouldn’t know how to wear that.’ We did an event not that long ago in New Jersey, where the coolest thing at this event happened. I had three generations in one family come to the trunk show. The grandmother, her daughter, and granddaughter. The coolest thing that I learned from that was that the granddaughter and the grandmother had the most in common from a fashion perspective.

IVL: Oh, the mom had a different point of view. It skipped—

MK: It skipped a generation! It was the craziest thing. The grandmother tried on a leather bomber jacket with a pair of cashmere trousers and a silk blouse. The next thing I knew, her granddaughter grabbed the jacket and said, “Oh, I would wear this with cutoffs.’

IVL: That’s perfect. Another question I never asked you, but what do you consider in your 45-year career as a “failure”?

MK: I never think that they’re failures. I think if you had every season, and every collection, a rave review, and everyone said, “Oh, he’s the best. He’s perfect”, that you’d be frozen. You’d be so self-referential that you would never actually move forward.

IVL: You have to fail.

MK: You just have to fail, and also sometimes I think fashion is all about timing. You might have something great, but it was just the wrong time for it. Honestly, there’ve been business problems; we had serious issues in the early 90s, and it was out of my control. It wasn’t in my hands, and I kept thinking, ‘What should I do? Did I make mistakes?’ Finally, I realized that what I have, no matter what, is my gut instinct. When you feel shaky, you have to go back to your self-confidence. So I never think of it as a failure. I think it’s timing. Of course, some people will say they don’t read reviews—I do. I read them, and when they’re great, you remember them forever. And when they’re terrible, you still remember them forever, but maybe you learn something. You learn as much from the bad review as you do from the good.

IVL: So true. In that respect, is there anything that you haven’t done yet, or a person that you would like to dress like? No matter who they are, even if they’re like already an ambassador for whatever brand? Maybe even design costumes for theater?

MK: We’ve done that. I have to say because I’m so travel obsessed, which is something that I had when I was really young, and it hasn’t gone away…

VM: You’re always on a plane!

MK: I am always on a plane. I’m always going somewhere. I do have I such a strong point of view about when you travel; what a hotel should feel like, what a restaurant could do, what an airplane could do, what a lounge in an airport could do. I think that’s something that would intrigue me. As far as who haven’t I dressed? Let’s think. Who haven’t we dressed? My lord, that’s a tough one…Well, I missed out on Queen Elizabeth II.

IVL: (*laughs*) Okay, fair.

MK: I mean, realistically, you know, we’ve dressed Kate Middleton, and the best is that Kate has worn Michael Michael Kors.

IVL: Which is major!

MK: Not runway clothes—she actually went into the store in London on Regent Street and bought a dress, and repeated it and wore it numerous times. It’s very different, generationally, than you know her mother-in-law. When Princess Diana wore Michael Kors, she wasn’t allowed to wear non-British designers.

IVL: Wow! Really?

MK: It had to be a secret; it was in the 80s—that was nutty.

IVL: Is there a picture of her in the dress?

MK: No, because I think she was afraid to get photographed. I remember exactly what it was. I was so excited. I’m trying to think really seriously in today’s world. Well, you know, she’s worn our clothes in bits and bobs, but I’m consistently wowed by Rihanna. This is a person who, when she’s just going out for spaghetti, she just gives me modern glamour better than anyone else. I’d love her to be someone we would work with more often.

IVL: That would be amazing. I get it.

MK: Like Rihanna walking to dinner at Giorgio Baldi in Los Angeles, just from the curb into the restaurant, she knocks me out.

IVL: It’s true. She’s never dull, always great. And then you know, I have this thing that I like that other people do that I’ve never done with anyone because I’ve never interviewed anyone else but you now. I really like this thing where people like give you a a word and you have to have a quick answer. The first one: if Michael Kors was a song, what song would it be?

MK: “Here Comes The Sun” by The Beatles

IVL: If Michael Kors was an art piece, what would it be?

MK: Something from Rothko.

IVL: If Michael Kors was a book, what would it be?

MK: The Great Gatsby.

IVL: This is so fun. If Michael Kors was a TV show, what would it be?

MK: I Love Lucy!

IVL: (*laughs*) I knew that one! 

VM:  If Michael Kors was a city, what would it be?

MK: Listen, with my voice, I could be nothing but New York City.

IVL: That’s it! There we go.

MK: Wait a minute, is this truly the first interview you’ve [conducted] together?

IVL: Yeah! I don’t think we’ve interviewed anyone together.

MK: I only did it once. This sounds a little name-droppy. It’s a long story, but I interviewed Elizabeth Taylor.

IVL: That’s nuts!

MK: It was for Harper’s Bazaar. And you know what? I remember I was so scared, and she was so engaging and so funny. And before we started, I said to her, “If there’s anything that you don’t want to answer, just tell me. And she looked at me, and she said, “Are you kidding? She said, “At this point, I have said everything to everyone.”

IVL: That’s incredible. & she makes me think of the one part we didn’t touch on: your enormous contribution in a philanthropic way, and specifically, I think now you’re involved with The American LGBTQ+ Museum.

MK: Yes! You know, fashion people love to complain. Everyone’s a mess. Like, ‘Oh my God, Milan was so hot.’ I’m like, get the fuck over it. I mean, we are so fortunate to do what we do. This is the greatest gift in the world. And so for me, I always say the gift is knowing what you want to do, knowing what you love, and then to actually succeed at doing it and to succeed beyond your wildest dreams. I feel that I’ve been given so much opportunity by my family, by this city, by the people who I’ve come in contact with, so [my involvement with the museum] it’s kind of like a good tennis game. I’ve got to hit the ball back.

IVL: Totally.

MK: We’re all so busy, we assume things are a certain way, and then we find out that they’re not. When I was first brought into the conversation, they said, “America’s first LGBTQ+ museum is going to be opening in 2028 on Central Park West,” and I stopped the conversation. I said, “No, no, that’s impossible. We have a museum.” And they said, “No, we don’t.” And I said, “No… that’s impossible. Excuse me, this is New York City. We have an ice cream museum. We have a sex museum. We have every museum, and we don’t have this?” and so when I sat down and I heard this, I thought “Now this is a game changer.” I like to do just as what I do with, hopefully, my work. I think the philanthropy that Lance and I like to get involved with is the things that can shift people’s perspectives.

IVL: Yes, exactly. Very important.

MK: Whether it’s a non-profit theater, whether it’s God’s Love We Deliver, this museum, the Stonewall Visitors Center—all of these things that can shift people’s perception, and it really is my way of saying “Thank you for letting me do what I love.” It’s my way of hitting the tennis ball back into the court. We’re all in it together.

VM: That’s why we love New York. 

IVL: That’s the great thing about New York. It’s always changing.

MK: Always. Never count a New Yorker down. Never count the city down. It will shift. It will change. It will always grow, and you will always be inspired if you keep your eyes open. That’s just the way it is.

This story appears in the pages of V162, our upcoming Fall 2026 issue. Get a one-year subscription to V now at shop.vmagazine.com!