Michael Kors has done a make-up range! And he’s sitting at Claridges, explaining to me that it doesn’t have any boring basics in it like foundation, 'only the sexy stuff that goes on top - the lips and tips.' Ah, lips and tips - a lovely expression that I am more than happy to type, but rather anxious to say out loud in front of the multiple award-winning fashion designer, lest my tongue get the better of me. 

I do wonder what it means to him, exactly, though. 'Quite frankly,' says the man who dressed Michelle Obama in her first official portrait as First Lady, and who was listed by Time magazine as one of the most influential people in the world... and now I’m worried he’s going to launch into a hilarious tirade against me, like he does on Project Runway. But no - Mr Kors is charmingly straightforward today. 

'I was never interested in the basics,' he continues.'I’m not interested in becoming your foundation go-to guy, or your concealer go-to, or your mascara - that’s not what I do. I am all about what goes on top. The sexy things that help you transform yourself.'

Which is why the range contains bright fuchsia nails, tropical citrus perfumes, a damson lip-lustre, and bronzers that bring the beach to your tired face this autumn. (Well, I have to say they’ve been working a treat on mine, and I was someone who didn’t really get bronzer.) The collection does also contain a range of nudes though - so not everything is bright and bold. Why is that?  

'If you think about a wardrobe, there's no woman who's going to do without a great black dress, or an amazing pair of black trousers. That's the go-to every day. But then the other ones are when you're feeling more outrageous, you open your closet and you go, gah, I don't wanna wear black again, I feel like going crazy. Even if somebody says she’s never worn fuchsia and it’s too much - I wanted her to be able to dip her toe into the fuchsia polish pot.' 

He also wanted the range to work on any skin tone - he describes using it in his spring shows, where the colours would look equally good on an Asian model as on Karen Elson, 'who’s the palest of redheads.' So, his aim is inclusivity. Indeed, he tells me that he wants to make women feel 'like they just stepped off the boat - even if they just stepped out of the office in London.' 

Michael Kors has been reflecting a lot on the time he spent at a Hamptons beach club as a boy. His whole extended family would go there every weekend - the boho hippy chick aunt, the sexy aunt who was the Cher of our family,' his mother, who was a sporty model who barely wore make-up, and then his grandmother, who was the exact opposite, with her matching turquoise dress, turquoise shoes, turquoise jewellery and turquoise handbag. 

Especially with his three new fragrances, he wanted to recreate a certain feeling. 'There’s something about the end of the day, when you leave the beach and you shower. You have wet hair and you put on something crisp. In the summer months, when I was growing up, my family would always change into white for dinner. It’s that golden, citrus hour.'

"Quite frankly, I was never interested in the basics. I am all about what goes on top. The sexy things that help you transform yourself."

Mmm. So what, then, does Michael Kors think if he runs into a scruffy girl who hasn't washed her hair - maybe backstage at a show, a model who's just turned up in her Converse? 

'LOVE!' he says. 'My favourite!'

But there is a catch - he says you have to hide the effort you put into your scruffiness. 'For the spring collection, I wanted it to be all about clothes that had caught the wind. I wanted the models’ hair to look like they had just pulled it up, knotted it, and got in the Convertible. But in fact it takes effort. I think we look at women like Lauren Hutton, Kate Moss, Alexa Chung, and we think - ohhh, she just threw that together. But! You have to be proficient.'

It is all about balance, he says. 

'Women are so smart today they're mixing it all up anyway. I’ll see someone on the street, wearing a Michael Kors piece with a vintage piece and a piece from the Gap and a piece from Comme des Garcons. That's how people actually dress. I always think if you wear one glamorous piece and one laid-back piece - if you're wearing a really bright lip, have a bare face and just pin your hair up. There's that yin and yang that just works. Very few people can handle over-the-top. Elizabeth Taylor did it fabulously. Anna Della Russo does it fabulously. But for most people I say, don't try this at home. Think about Kate, think about Alexa, think about Lauren Hutton, and grab that one piece.'

Michael Kors was recently honoured by the Fashion Institute of Technology, at a special lunch in New York, 'and I looked around the room and women were very dressed. All in luncheon dresses. Then Iman walked in wearing a leopard coat of ours with just a black silk shirt and a pair of camel trousers. I loved the idea that she looked tailored and fierce at the same time. She didn't think that fierce had to be a skin-tight dress. She didn't think tailored had to be fully masculine.' 

Finally, I tell Kors that my editor said Michael's clothes are often stereotyped to a ‘jetrosexual’ customer who doesn't wear tights in winter - is that fair? 'Jetrosexual!' he roars. 'I love it! Oh I’m using THAT one. It will go with ‘glamouflage’, a word I made up when we did a very Park Avenue take on camouflage. Well, the thing is that what I design is really about movement and speed. For some people that's a private plane, and for other people that's two buses and a ride on the subway. But it's about a fast life. When people say to me, what do the rich do differently? If you are going to a party at night, even if it's freezing cold and you’re getting off the bus - if you're bare-legged and wear a sandal at night, everyone thinks you have a car and a driver. Same thing as having healthy skin when everyone else looks pale. So if I can make you LOOK like you've been able to take a holiday in St Barts - well, I think that’s a plus.' 

From St Barts to bare-faced beauty - see our favourite backstage make-up looks from Michael Kors' fashion shows in the gallery above.

The Michael Kors Make-up, Body and Fragrance Collection, from £15 at House of Fraser