The German designer has spent decades living in Paris, and designs for what is perhaps France’s most iconic house. Still, he considers himself a stranger in the French capital. Lagerfeld revealed this after Hidalgo presented him with La Medaille Grand Vermeil de la Ville de Paris. 

“Paris loves you. You are Paris,” the French mayor told him at a ceremony that followed the fashion show.

Yet Lagerfeld insists he isn’t Paris, actually. That’s the key to perceiving the city’s beauty, he says. He is able to appreciate the place because he’s not fully at home there.

“I am a foreigner and I intend to stay a foreigner because foreigners see Paris and France through a different eye,” he explained, as he accepted the award from Hidalgo. “And when you are not French, you look without nationalism or patriotism… Long live Paris.”

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