We love you so much we even transcribed the interview:

The picture says so much. After a highly publicized sabbatical from her very public career, Kate Moss wants to take things a little easier from now on. A little slower, more relaxed. But this iconic waif wrapped in white mink while resting at the Ritz is hardly a girl about to turn her back on the fashion world that made her a star, household name and pop culture diva.

What Kate needed, she maintains, was a little r&r-rest and relaxation. She claims to have found both at The Priory, a London psychiatric and rehab clinic she checked herself into last November. "I just needed that break," Kate says of her stay, the only real respite she has taken from the celebrity swirl of supermodel-dom since skyrocketing to fame in her Calvins when she was a teenager. "Now I feel much stronger...It can start to weigh you down."

Moss certainly looks at the top of her form-and, as anyone who has looked at a fashion magazine this decade will tell you, that's quite a fabulous place to be. "I'm feeling great," she says, despite a recent bout with the flu. "It was really good just to be with people who didn't care who I was, and I could just be myself for a while, hanging out and being normal. Being treated normally is nice. But," she adds, without a trace of irony, "people can get funny when you're famous. It's strange. They can treat you differently."

Whether Kate found ultimate resolution at The Priory-she refuses to discuss the particulars of her program-remains to be seen. Her conversation, chatty, bright, animated, nevertheless reflects some of the paradox of the photograph. She announces good health and happiness with conviction, but gives way to moments of conflict.

Since getting back on the runway and in front of the camera, for example, she has been working just about nonstop. That's partly because one result of her time off has been a newfound passion for her work. She started her comeback on the runway of old pal and kindred spirit in the ways of glamour, Donatella Versace, working the Versace and Versus men's shows in Milan and the couture show in Paris, both in January. Kate also did Chanel couture for Karl Lagerfeld, and, of course, was the star of the season. It's been shoot, shoot, shoot ever since.

"I was quite nervous for the first show, " she says, "It was like a whole new experience, seeing things in a different way. You can get jaded doing it so long. You can think, 'I'm bored of this.' But going back to it after a time off is almost like starting over." Nevertheless, she vows to slow down after this month-really. "I'm working a lot," Kate concedes. "I'm going to do this month and then take a break. I don't want to work continually. I want time for myself, for reading books, for friends, walks in the country-just time."

But finding the resolve to say no-both to excessive work and excessive play-in a world more adoring and demanding than ever no doubt presents a daunting challenge. Perhaps that's why, when Donatella threw Kate a big 25th birthday bash at Les Bains Douche following the Versace couture show, Mummy Moss was along for the celebration. "She's really cool, my mum," Kate says.

Clearly Moss revels in her work and it's creative possibilities. And unlike some models, she makes no apology for loving clothes. "I love the way different clothes make you feel. It's quite an extension to who you are," she muses. "It can be quite shallow looking at it that way, but other people look at the way you dress-I think it's just quite a strong way of showing people who you are. And I think clothes that are cut well with beautiful tailoring, or a dress with amazing details-there are things about clothes that are really special."

Still, Kate has spent scant time shopping lately, although she has continued to indulge her penchant for vintage clothes: "Twenties, old lace, Thirties dresses-all different things." And she wants to start upping her knowledge of furniture and art, especially since she is now the lady of the manor. Moss, who lives in London, recently bought a country house near the town of Marlow, "on the way to Oxford."

"I needed somewhere to go on the weekends to relax," she says. "It's just a country house with land around it. It's close to a town, but you can't see anything from the house. It's seclusion, and it's really poetic in a way."

That quest for peace and quiet will remain a weekend pursuit, at least for now. While Moss maintains that she has no plans for her next career yet, she voices a firm "no" when asked about interest in acting, and expects to model indefinitely. "I'm not going to stop if there are still fun things, nice jobs, and if I still enjoy working and there's an energy," she says. "I'm just kind of taking it slowly. I'm not ready to get into another career anytime soon. I'm quite happy."

And why not? The Concorde is a long way from coach, and the insecurities of being, essentially, a little girl on her own in a fast world. Kate's discovery story rivals that of Lana Turner at the soda fountain: a genuine waif, just 14 years old, discovered in an airport. In an instant, her life was changed forever, as she took off on a route she acknowledges is not necessarily suited to adolescent levels of common sense and responsibility. But she's not about to blame the industry.

"It was hard at times, traveling on a lot of planes, being alone a lot," Kate recalls. "It toughens you up. And if you don't like it, you can always go home. You're not made to stay.

"I think it's really about the individual and the parents-it's more their responsibility," she continues. "My parents said, 'Go for it, if you want to, but we're staying here.' I wanted to do it. I can imagine for girls who are not as street smart, it could be quite tough. Girls do start quite young, and some might be led astray. It was fine with me. I wanted to go off. I don't know, it is hard for young girls in the business, but more and more today, they have people from the agencies traveling with them."

Those young girls, legions of them, have grown up worshiping at the paper altar of Kate Moss-a potentially oppressive reality. However, as she puts it, "I just don't think about that at all. I just want to get on with my life. I can't be responsible for the rest of humanity. It would just do my head in."

But she is concerned for her public image. Even the most super of supermodels can grow weary of exposure, especially the kind that portrays her as an overindulgent party girl with a fast-lane love life. "I'd like to say it didn't bother me," she says, as if working through the conflict for herself. "But when it's horrible, sometimes it gets to me. Other times I shrug it off. It's been going on for so long, it doesn't really affect me anymore."

Kate stops to contradict herself. "I suppose I do care. Yeah, who wouldn't care?"