(By Daniela Giammusso)

Italian model and actress Eva Riccobono shared her reflections on life, looks and the world of work as she starred at Milano Beauty Week, a week of events devoted to the culture of beauty and wellness created by Cosmetica Italia in collaboration with Cosmoprof and Esxence. "I discovered beauty with age," the international top model and Palermo native, who is now also a cinema and theatre actress, told a meeting organized by the Rougj brand on the importance of the Italian beauty sector on the European panorama. "As a child in Sicily, I felt a bit like a fish out of water," added Riccobono, who has pale skin, blond hair, eyes that are almost the colour of ice and has become an icon of beauty and style on catwalks all over the word. "The women have to be shapely, Mediterranean, there. "I looked around myself and realised something wasn't right. "In this sense, fashion has been therapeutic".

She also stressed, however, that "beauty is not enough". "At the casting sessions there would be a hundred girls more beautiful than me," she said. "It (beauty) is necessary but it has to be accompanied by the thoughts and nuances of a human being". Riccobono said that she might be "the only woman in show business never to have had a (plastic-surgery) injection". "Naturally, never say never, but I'm against wanting to change at all costs. "With all the botox that woman have today, problems start to arise in relations with their children because their faces no longer express emotions. "Besides, I don't like what I see out and about - people, including very young people, who end up looking twice their age. "I think it's absolutely wrong to want to look younger. "When I look at my daughter, I think of her as the future of youth. "And I don't want to be her sister, I want to be her mother. "I'm happy about this". 

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