“Kate Moss outstanding! Let’s agree on that word. Yes indeed, ms Kate Moss is truly outstanding. So, let’s go back many moons ago when we first met back in the 90s. I was working a lot in Los Angeles and yours truly was doing a lot of shoots for Interview Magazine. I was working with a great stylist, Kim Bowen. Being British she had a very joyful way of introducing everyone she likes to all her friends and colleagues. That day I’m shooting a very famous actress. Sorry folks, I am not dropping a name, she’s one of those redhead beauties like Ann Margret or Julianne Moore. And Kim just comes out with it, “just like that” spoken in a perfect Tommy Cooper accent, that she has a young friend, Kate Moss coming by the shoot that she wants me to meet. Being polite, of course I agree. Anyway, the shoot goes on and I am in my element glamour girls at the beach. You know the old school glam girls, like Rita Hayworth and Lana Turner, but of course with a twist. I mean frankly, it’s like drinking rum with Coca Cola, it’s modern and it is called Bacardi and Coke, and yes, I drop in the name of the brand. Anyway, around twelve, in comes Kate. I see a little fawn walking in the garden. She is cute, adorable and her charm is her smile and her accent. I look at her portfolio. This, while I am working hard photographing a beautiful very well-known redhead actress… whose eyes are already on the back of my neck, so…reality… In the now… avanti, pronto, move, work on buddy. And…Kate’s just arrived from London…she asks if she can strip off…we are not talking about being nude! No, she just wants to lay in the LA sun close to the pool in her underwear. Now, we have a problem! Put 2 beautiful women in the same room. What will happen? In my heart I want to take some photos of Kate right there and then and but my head says shut up Michel, just focus on the shoot. Well, everything went well with the shoot. Or so, I thought. I knew I would see Kate again. The actress, ever the professional, gave me a goodbye peck on the cheek. The end of the story? Oh no…the next morning I received a call from my agent who had taken a call from the actress’ publicist. All was messed up; she was very upset because with everything going on during the shoot… I was seemingly not paying enough attention to her. Good grief, my God, I was gobsmacked, and speechless. Well, life twists and turns and I did work with her again, everything was forgotten but of course I didn’t have another beauty on the set. Lesson learned mr Haddi. And the second time I met Kate we did worked together. I was on a job at Bloomingdales. A very interesting one thanks to John Jay and Helane Blumfeld. The brief - a film and photos with 3 models and guess who one of the young model is? I’m told her name. I burst out laughing for the simple reason that I have met her, and I knew her. Kate Moss. Working with Kate is about grace and a beautiful calmness. My camera loved her. Of course, the other models got pissed off, as I spent too much time with Kate. She ended up opening the film and closing it. Bloomingdales were so ecstatic with my work that they ended up doing walls of video screens in all their shops in the USA. Et voila, we did one more shoot for GQ UK. Kate went on to become the fabulous icon she is now. For my part, usually being so much into a “new next best thing”… I don’t forget that the grass is not always greener on the other side of the fence we saw each other again in Cannes when she was the girlfriend of Johnny Depp. I had just finished working with Johnny and the photos were on the billboards; all over Cannes. Yes, for sure you couldn’t miss the images. Kate wrote me a beautiful note, which I have placed in this book… “dear Michel, your pictures of Johnny Depp are beautiful, maybe you could take a picture with me sometimes lots of love Kate”. Sadly, we never worked with each other again. It is what it is, the most important things, are immense memories and great images.”