Mine was a fashionable feel of shallowness

I didn't look like any of those things. I looked more like Sid Vicious dressed as Father Christmas. Or, as my father might have put it: I looked a fool.

I'd returned home with a pair of 26-inch waist, bright red drainpipes. Slim as I was during my early-teens, I had to lie on the bed to squeeze myself into them. I coupled the trousers with a red sweatshirt and a pair of black pixie boots, which I wore over the top of the trousers. All I needed was a white beard. Ho ho ho. Merry Christmas.

My first brush with fashion came at Birmingham's Rag Market. Each Saturday morning I'd board the 245 bus, from Tipton to Wednesbury, then jump on the 79 to Birmingham, before heading to the Rag Market. It dazzled my senses. Fabrics, cutting edge designs, bootleg goods – you name it, it sold it.

From there, I'd migrate to Oasis, which sold everything from tutus to tattoos, beads to boots and everything else in between. Fashionistas like Boy George and Martin Degville started out there and it was the place in town for people in search of originality. I was captivated. A lifelong interest in threads had begun.

My tastes became more refined, or so I'd like to think, as I progressed through the labels to the best that British and Italian fashion houses had to offer. My eight Vivienne Westwood suits hang proudly in my wardrobe.

And then I arrived in Milan. It was late autumn and I'd gone to one of my favourite cities for a long weekend and I was staying at the Park Hyatt, one of the city's finest hotels and a magnet for the world's fashion industry. The bar was crowded with makers and shakers, designers and refiners, models and photographers.

The concierge gave me a potted history of the hotel and then led me to the lift.

As the doors were about to close, the point of an electric blue stiletto poked its way through the door. In walked BEAUTY. The world's most elegant woman, with eyes like fire, an Amazonian figure and clothes straight from her designer's boutique. She looked at the concierge and I, as though we were shoeshine boys, then stared straight ahead and waited for the doors to close.

The concierge had the look of a man who'd seen it all before. He was used to being ignored by the world's beautiful people, it was all in a day's work. I'd never seen anyone – or anything – quite so beautiful. She was exquisite and adorable, a delicate fascination.

Later that evening, I went down to dinner. I was dressed in all my finery. I was newly skinny – 30, rather than 26 inch waist – and my striped D&G trousers were offset by a D&G shirt, Alexander McQueen waistcoat and killer pair of black Dior shoes.

I strolled across the floor of the hotel to the lift and descended to the restaurant. As the doors opened, the Amazonian woman was standing there. I did what fashion people do. Looked straight ahead, walked straight out and pretended I hadn't even seen her.

I fixed my eyes on the glass doors of the restaurant, straight ahead, and as I did, I caught her – and my – reflection. She was looking over her shoulder at the little fella in the Dior shoes who'd breezed straight past her without a care in the world. She'd missed the lift. Her eyes blazed 'curious', her shoulders said 'interested' and I didn't give a hoot. Somewhere deep inside,

I marvelled at my momentary triumph.

Vacuous, hollow and pointlessly shallow – my actions were all of those things. And, do you know what, it felt absolutely wonderful.

Andy Richardson