Tom Ford opened up about drinking, drugs, design, decor and a chance encounter with a devil who loves Prada in an interview with Maureen Dowd that ran over the weekend in The New York Times.
The man who shot to fame as the creative director of both Gucci and Yves Saint Laurent before going on to found his on eponymous label spoke about everything from his famous friends and massive real estate portfolio to his decision to get sober over a decade ago.
'For several years leading up to stopping drinking - because I drank a lot - on the mornings after, I would have to send flowers to this one and flowers to that one and, "Oh, I can’t believe I did that" and "I can’t believe I said that," and I told [his partner] Richard [Buckley] for at least a year, "Oh my God, I wish I could just not drink at all,"' confessed Ford.
'And the drinking was the open door for the drugs. Three drinks and anything I could hoover, anything was going to happen.'
Dowd noted that Ford, 57, mimicked doing a line of cocaine while saying this to her.
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Fashion: Tom Ford talks openly about his cocaine usage in an interview with The New York Times and expresses his love for the 'kindest, gentlest' Terry Richardson (right in 2009, with Anna Wintour in 2003 on left)
Glitterati: Ford also recalls going to Studio 54 for the first time in college with Andy Warhol, saying: 'I did a lot of coke' (l to r: Halston, Bianca Jagger, Liza Minnelli, Andy Warhol)
Ford also spent a good deal of the interview talking about - and in some cases defending - his famous friends.
Those friends include the most powerful force in all of fashion, who Ford revealed once spotted him on a nude beach while he was wearing nothing but his sunglasses.
Ford called the day Anna Wintour stumbled on him bathing in the nude on a beach in St Barts as a 'wake up call.'
When asked about the encounter, Wintour demurred: 'Everyone was naked in St. Barts in those days. And if it happened, I’m sure Tom looked as perfect as he always does.'
The designer later spoke about his longtime collaborator Terry Richardson, who has been accused of sexual misconduct by a number of women in the fashion industry.
'Ugh! I love Terry,' said Ford.
'And I have to say that I never in my entire life saw any of that with Terry. One of my assistants went out with Terry for two years and he was the kindest, gentlest person in the relationship.'
Ford said it was an unlikely individual who actually put him on the path to sobriety.
'I was at an afternoon party at a friend’s
