Top 40 Andre Leon Talley Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “Beauty is health. Health is beauty.”

— Andre Leon Talley

Featured in: Beauty Quotes, You Are Beautiful Quotes

2. “The most luxurious item is a beautiful bed and beautiful, simple sheets.”

— Andre Leon Talley

3. “I don’t tear down. I prefer to build up.”

— Andre Leon Talley

4. “I’m so sick of mermaid dresses, trains, borrowed bling-bling, and a pose.”

— Andre Leon Talley

5. “I know what it is like to be brought up with unconditional love. In my life that came from my grandmother.”

— Andre Leon Talley

6. “I do believe there’s a heaven. I do believe that God has given me the resilience and the survival skills to withstand the chiffon trenches.”

— Andre Leon Talley

7. “When I have interns, I always say, ‘Handwritten thank-you notes can make a difference.’ People remember that – not an e-mail, a handwritten note in an envelope.”

— Andre Leon Talley

8. “I’m usually at home and in bed by 10 o’clock. I do not want to be out at anybody’s New Year’s Eve party.”

— Andre Leon Talley

9. “You cannot live your life in the elitist world of fashion and not step out or you’re disconnected. You have to realize that fashion is not the endgame.”

— Andre Leon Talley

10. “Some days are good; some days are not so good. Some days are really exciting. Some days are just tedious. You just have to get up out of bed.”

— Andre Leon Talley

11. “I love Russian culture. I don’t know the young Russia, I’m not at all familiar with young Russia, but the old school Russia is good enough for me for the moment.”

— Andre Leon Talley

12. “Drekitude is the lowest point in the lowest ebb. It could be your look. It could be your shoes. It could be that you’re standing wrong. Drek is a total, total, total hot mess.”

— Andre Leon Talley

13. “Wearing clothes should be a personal narrative of emotion. I always respond to fashion in an emotional way.”

— Andre Leon Talley

14. “I love people – it is not the fashion, it is the people in fashion I love.”

— Andre Leon Talley

15. “I just need green. I need to wake up and see grass and squirrels. I don’t want to see skyscrapers.”

— Andre Leon Talley

16. “People need to be edited; life needs to be edited. I need to be edited.”

— Andre Leon Talley

17. “I have 4 bedrooms in my house. 1 is for guests, the other 3 are for closets.”

— Andre Leon Talley

18. “The zenith of elegance in any woman’s wardrobe is the little black dress, the power of which suggests dash and refinement.”

— Andre Leon Talley

19. “I personally go to the airport looking like a homeless person, because I think people will leave me alone. But I dress myself with my luggage – all my luggage matches.”

— Andre Leon Talley

20. “The late Estee Lauder says you can never wear white shoes after Labor Day. But of course, in today’s world, that does not exist.”

— Andre Leon Talley

21. “Fashion illustrator Antonio Lopez was a major part of my early career.”

— Andre Leon Talley

22. “I suppose the most daring thing I’ve ever done is try to water ski. And that was not successful.”

— Andre Leon Talley

23. “I always feel comfortable, basically in any situation except perhaps airports.”

— Andre Leon Talley

24. “Waiting in line for something mundane is very boring. Waiting for my doctor to see me and waiting for my dentist to see me, yes, that is boring.”

— Andre Leon Talley

25. “Mrs. Obama has a hug – a sincere and friendly embrace – that has become familiar to countless supporters from coast to coast. And when she talks to you, she focuses all her calm attention on your face.”

— Andre Leon Talley

26. “I think people look great in black. I love that what stands out is the person, especially. Black just conveys a kind of drama, even if it can be quiet drama. It does lend to the wearer a sense of confidence.”

— Andre Leon Talley

27. “One my favorite things is to go to the provinces of Russia and see the 18th century wood churches with the onion dome architecture. These humble wonders of incredible imagination of architects that were obviously not living in places like Paris or London, but they’ve created these amazing churches.”

— Andre Leon Talley

28. “At an early age I discovered the beauty in pictures in ‘Vogue’ magazine and Ebony magazine, and I would read ‘The New York Times.’ I had to make my own world within my world because I was an only child.”

— Andre Leon Talley

29. “People love fashion exhibits because they can fantasize. They can respond to a dress even if they can never wear a dress like that.”

— Andre Leon Talley

30. “Uggs can be as chic as heels for women.”

— Andre Leon Talley

31. “Look at ‘American Idol,’ which I don’t look at. Those winners haven’t become household names except for Jennifer Hudson, and she was a reject. You can’t aim to be a household name. You just have to be successful.”

— Andre Leon Talley

32. “It’s always great to have things from France at a wedding. It’s symbolic of style, of culture, of taste.”

— Andre Leon Talley

33. “You come to Paris, you get true originality, and it’s wonderful.”

— Andre Leon Talley

34. “It’s incorrect to assume you can be a fashion editor because you blog, if you don’t have experience to look at fashion in a professional way.”

— Andre Leon Talley

35. “Money isn’t everything, but it is when you start thinking about putting money away for your retirement days.”

— Andre Leon Talley

36. “I only watch MSNBC for the news.”

— Andre Leon Talley

37. “There is room in today’s world for men to wear dresses.”

— Andre Leon Talley

38. “I think it’s important that models be healthy.”

— Andre Leon Talley

39. “In my day you didn’t speak until spoken to.”

— Andre Leon Talley

40. “Like Hillary Clinton before her, Mrs. Obama has always been a working woman. She is a lawyer turned hospital administrator turned political right hand. It is a unique resume.”

— Andre Leon Talley

41. “Reality TV, although I’m a part of it, I think reality TV is a terrible thing.”

— Andre Leon Talley

42. “I only take risks in couture, but I don’t take risks in athleticism.”

— Andre Leon Talley

43. “First Ladies have always been held like specimens under a media microscope.”

— Andre Leon Talley