Van Noten's work is all about balance and harmony, with these values extending into his personal life. When not in Paris, or working at his Antwerp headquarters, he can be found knee-deep in rose bushes, nurturing his garden at the home he shares with partner Patrick Vangheluwe, just outside the Belgian city.

'I need to have a very normal life in the countryside,' Van Noten says. 'I am really, really into gardening. The day has only 24 hours. I enjoy life, I like to eat well, to cook, to garden and to have fun with my dog, and in that way I can be creative. If I had to give up that time just to make 'It' bags, then no thank you.'

Born in 1958, Van Noten is no stranger to discipline, having attended a strict Jesuit school. During times of crisis between the world wars, his grandfather, a tailor like Van Noten's father, made a living by turning second-hand clothes inside out and reworking them into new outfits. The family's influence on Antwerp fashion increased when Van Noten was growing up; his father opened an upscale men's boutique on the outskirts of town, then another multibrand store in the city centre, introducing many craft-focused fashion labels such as Salvatore Ferragamo, Ermenegildo Zegna and Emanuel Ungaro to the city.

Van Noten's respect for traditional tailoring and reluctance to use gimmicks have garnered a cult following. Having chosen to miss out on the lucrative 'It' bag market, low-brow collaborations and diffusion lines, his is fashion for the more cerebral. And since he prefers that people dress with character rather than 'try to pick up a Dries Van Noten image', we are guaranteed that, within his collections, hemlines and waists won't go up or down according to fads.

Although not particularly classical or classic, Van Noten's dresses are often described as 'intelligently timeless'.

'I love tradition,' he says. 'I've had a traditional education. But that's not to say that I am nostalgic, or want to recreate the past. I want to respect the past but to look to the future. Both are important. I won't say, now that we can print digitally, let's get rid of screen-printing. I want to play with both options.'

Van Noten's mother collected antique lace and linen, so there was always the presence of traditional crafts in the family home - a preoccupation that would help shape the designer's aesthetic. Eccentric, refined prints and ethnic techniques are hallmarks of his work.

'It's one big world,' he reasons, 'and what I like about ethnic garments is their originality. It is always very material-focused and precious. Kimonos are always a certain length of fabric, or look at the sari - it's just a long rectangle of fabric and just their way of draping. That way of putting things together is sometimes lost.'

As the most diverse and globally minded of the Antwerp Six (a group that includes Ann Demeulemeester and Walter Van Beirendonck and placed the Belgian city on the fashion map), Van Noten is also the most successful. Yet, when he was inducted into fashion, the industry was far from being fully internationalised; there was no internet, and Van Noten learned the tricks of the trade at home and on the occasional business trip in Europe with his father.

Having decided to design rather than just trade fashion, Van Noten enrolled at Antwerp's Royal Academy of Fine Arts at the age of 18. Upon graduating, he would become an instant hit with beautifully tailored blazers, shirts and trousers that reflected his family history.

In 1986, the first Dries Van Noten boutique opened, in Antwerp, selling menswear and womenswear. Three years later he would move to an old department store building on the outskirts of the city, once home to his grandfather's biggest competitor.

Business is flourishing, with stores in Singapore, Dubai and Hong Kong, but there was a time during the minimalist-loving 1990s when Van Noten's style fell out of vogue. It was also in the late-90s that he lost friend and business partner Christine Mathys to cancer. Van Noten weathered the emotional storm and resisted selling out to a big fashion house, meaning that today, this multimillion-euro label - available in about 500 outlets worldwide - remains an independent, self-financed operation.

There are two sides to being independent, however, the designer diplomatically notes.

'On one hand, I am very happy to be free to make my own decisions, but sometimes it would be nice to have the backing of a big group because you wouldn't have all the responsibility. I'm not only the designer, I'm also responsible for everything that happens in the company, for the whole team.'

Van Noten is not entirely opposed to the idea of taking on investors. 'Maybe,' he says, with an unenthusiastic shrug, 'Never say never. It gives new opportunities and certain possibilities, so why not? I have to think about the future of the company - I won't live forever.'

However, it's not world domination Van Noten is looking for.

'It's not like this year we have to launch a perfume and next year we have to increase this per cent of the bag business and shoe business. No - I don't care about this,' Van Noten says. 'The company has to stay healthy and I have to enjoy myself - especially that. The moment it becomes too business driven, it will be hard for me to stay creative.'

He has largely shunned mass-marketing techniques such as advertising campaigns because, as the designer says, not all publicity is good publicity.

'We did a few ads in the 80s,' he says. 'Then we quickly saw that we didn't really have much budget to spend' and choosing to place advertisements with one magazine over another brought its own complications.

'Also, different types of people can like our clothes and I don't want to choose one person - a model or campaign face - who has to be blond or dark, young or middle aged, strong or soft, and represent the whole world - people don't see our clothes like that.

'When we started the Antwerp Six [all of whom came through the Royal Academy], it was very easy and simple,' says Van Noten, 'you just had the four fashion cities in the world: London, New York, Paris and Milan, and a handful of journalists to know.

'Now, with the internet, it can get very complicated for young designers. Suddenly, there are millions of 'judges' who all say what they think without enough background information. It can be tricky.'

Not that Van Noten has faced much online criticism. The reception to his label by both veterans and new media hipsters has been overwhelmingly positive in recent years.

For his spring-summer 2012 womenswear collection, about to hit the racks in Hong Kong, Van Noten went off piste, diluting his print obsession with a simple palette of vintage countryside etchings and city nightscapes. Reviews have applauded his sense of poetic sophistication.

He has taken on Spanish influences in toreador jackets, black lace and voluminous feminine shapes. Some outfits are based on the photography of Briton James Reeve, which intrigued Van Noten at a festival at which he was a judge in 2010. In November, the two held a joint exhibition at the Fringe Club in Central.

Van Noten says he wanted 'to change my language of printing. I thought it would be interesting to use all elements that were not meant to be printed on textile - from there came the idea of the 18th-century etching, combined with 21st-century photography, mixed with drawings of roses from the 19th century - all meshed together.'

Just as he eschews personifying his label with one model, Van Noten never uses a single person as a muse - it would be 'too flat' to imagine just dressing this or that actress, he says. Instead, he teaches his studio crew to stitch together an imaginary combination of characters, with his team adding their own layers of personality.

'The good thing for me is that inspiration can come from everywhere,' says Van Noten, who, in 2008, won the Council of Fashion Designers of America International Award. 'It's never a system because when it becomes a system it's going to be dead. I need to surprise myself and my team.

'Elegance is something very personal,' he says. 'I think every woman can be elegant in her own way. It is really about 'feeling well' in how you behave and what you wear. Some people can be perfectly elegant in a sports outfit or jeans and a T-shirt and some people need a lot of expensive clothes to do it.'

His elegant Parisian boutique, on Quai Malaquais, in the Saint-Germain-des-Pres district, was Van Noten's first outside Antwerp. It opened in 2007, is filled with homely antiques and has the atmosphere of eras past. Exotic rugs and a plush sofa set the scene for an eccentric, intimate salon - it's old-world warmth encased by the black panelled exterior facing chilly Parisian streets. Imagining him sitting there, one wonders whether the charm of the French capital would ever tempt the Belgian to move permanently from his hometown. Perhaps here, in the City of Lights, the birthplace of couture, he would find more inspiration to fuel his now rather illustrious story?

'No, no, no!' Van Noten insists, shaking his head, 'I love the city, but I am always happy that I can leave.

'We live in the countryside so we have a good life and I love gardening. It's a good counter-balance because you have to keep your feet on the ground. Gardening is rooted in reality. In fashion - we can make it rain indoors or the sun shine for a runway show if we wanted, but in a garden it's not like that.'