FASHION > Pierre Cardin, still passionate about fashion 60 years on

Sixty years after launching himself into the world of fashion, French icon Pierre Cardin says fashion remains his drug and if he had to do it all again, he would without a moment's hesitation.

"I have no regrets. If I had to start my career again with the same ambitions I had when I was 20, I would do it all again with enthusiasm," Cardin told AFP, just a few weeks before his 84th birthday.

"It's a career that's brought me a lot of satisfaction in the creative field and in the financial field as well as notoriety," he said, relaxing in his Paris office, lined with books, press cuttings and photos taken with some of the world's most famous personalities.

The son of an Italian immigrant, he was once "lucky enough to be the youngest fashion designer in Paris," and now he's "obviously the oldest," said Cardin, who first joined Christian Dior in 1946.

Six decades later he has built up a vast empire, licensing sales of some 800 products bearing his name in 170 countries including everything from fashion, to a chain of Maxim's restaurants, perfumes, hotels, design and cultural institutes such as the Espace Cardin in Paris and the Chateau Lacoste in the Luberon, once the home of the Marquis de Sade.

A businessman and a honorary ambassador for UNESCO, Cardin remains passionate about fashion.

"Every day I design, it's my drug, I am very keen on fashion," he said.

After a 10-year absence from the French capital's ready-to-wear menswear shows, Cardin returns in a few weeks showing off his creations on wooden mannequins in his new cultural centre in the 4th arrondisement on July 4, two days after his birthday.

"I still think I have something to say," he said, adding he was determined to show that he was still around and just as creative as he always was.

It will be up to the audiences to determine whether lingering criticisms that his creations are going out of date are true, he said. "If I'm getting dated they will see it ... perhaps they are right, I've never made any claims."

In 1949 he left Dior to set up his own design house, and never looked back.

His bold, geometric avant garde designs made him a favourite of fashionistas the world over. In 1954 he invented the bubble dress, which has passed into fashion history.

But Cardin was also the first designer to bring fashion to the street.

Early on he realised the business potential of the fashion industry, and he opened up the market by turning to Japan, still rebuilding after World War II, after visiting the country in 1957.

He was the first designer to present a ready-to-wear women's collection at the Printemps Store in 1959, antagonising the sensibilities of the refined world of haute couture.

Today his empire, which he owns alone, is said to have an annual turnover of some six billion euros (7.5 billion dollars), and in 2005 Challenge magazine ranked him 59th among France's wealthiest people with a personal fortune of some 500 million euros.

But some reports have said parts of his empire, notably the restaurants and theatres, have slipped into the red.

In 2008, a large retrospective will be devoted to Cardin's work in the Paris City fashion museum the Galliera, which will have access to the designer's personal collection of some 10,000 items collected over the past 60 years.

Cardin has always refused to hold any sales, preferring to keep surplus stock in his personal museum, a warehouse with 3,500 square metres (37,000 square feet) of space for clothes and the same again for furniture.

For several years, he has been searching for a buyer for his empire but has not set a deadline saying he is waiting for the "most interesting and prestigious offer."

"I will carry on working, to be passionate about it and to be happy in my work. Nothing bores me. I have found my harmony in my work."