MOSCOW, May 14, 2010 (AFP) - French fashion designer Jean Paul Gaultier on Friday 14 May achieved a long-held dream by presenting his first haute couture collection in Russia at a Moscow railway station.

Photo: AFP

Gaultier said he was delighted to use the Kazansky railway terminus, one of Moscow's three main rail stations, as the backdrop for his fashion collection, saying it was an invitation to a journey.

"And my collection is a journey," he added.

"One of my dreams in Paris was to do a show in the restaurant at the Gare de Lyon," he said, referring to the railway station's famous belle epoque Train Bleu restaurant.

"That dream, I achieved it in Moscow."

Gaultier, 58, opened his first boutique in the centre of the Russian capital in 2005.

But he said he was surprised by the pace of change the city had seen since then. "This shows how much Russia is changing... Russia is open to the world," he said.

"I have the impression that now the rest of Europe is like an old sputnik," he said, adding that he saw Russia as "young and fresh" but at the same time able to hold on to "traditions and a strong past."