The Baby Phat designer returns.
Kimora Lee Simmons spots someone at the table across from her. She’s at her usual haunt, sitting with legs crossed in a plush, poppy-colored armchair in the opulent lobby restaurant of the Hôtel Plaza Athénée in Paris. She makes eye contact with an older black gentleman sipping a beautiful drink in a crystal glass. He gives a smile and a nod of recognition; she returns the nod in kind.
Simmons, the onetime model and onetime mogul, loves it here. She has spent stretches of the summer in Paris since she was 13, when she was plucked from a modeling school in a St. Louis mall, signed to an exclusive Chanel contract, and selected to wear the coveted last look in Karl Lagerfeld’s 1989 haute couture show: a wedding gown for the fashion industry’s child bride. Success and money led to frequent stays at the Plaza Athénée like a barely adult Eloise. She threw her children’s birthday parties here. (Once, there was a Marie Antoinette theme.) She spent time here with her ex-husband, Def Jam co-founder Russell Simmons, whom she met when she was 17 and he was 35.
Now, at 44, Simmons rents an apartment just around the corner but comes to the Plaza Athénée lobby several times a week, talking for hours and ordering snacks for her four children, three of whom are here today—Aoki Lee, 17; Ming Lee, 19; and Kenzo Lee, 10. (Her 4-year-old is at home napping.) Here, everything you touch is of lush velvet, the sounds are of spindly heels tapping on a marble floor and a harp playing, the smells are of the most delicate florals, and the tastes are of fresh white truffle sprinkled on pasta.
This story is from the August 19 - September 1, 2019 edition of New York magazine.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Sign In
This story is from the August 19 - September 1, 2019 edition of New York magazine.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
The City Politic- The Other Eric Adams Scandal The NYPD shot a fare evader, a cop, and two bystanders. He defends it.
On Sunday, September 15, Derell Mickles hopped a turnstile, got asked to leave by cops, then entered the subway again ten minutes later through an emergency exit. This was at the Sutter Avenue L station, out by his mother's house, five stops from the end of the line. Police said they noticed he was holding a folded knife. They followed him up the stairs to the elevated train, asking him 38 times to drop the weapon.
Can the Media Survive?
BIG TECH, Feckless Owners, CORD-CUTTERS, RESTIVE STAFF, Smaller Audiences ... and the Return of PRINT?
Status Update
Hannah Gadsby's fascinatingly untidy tour through life after fame and death.
A Matter of Perspective
A Matter of Perspective Steve McQueen's worst film is still a solid WWII drama.
Creator, Destroyer
A retrospective reveals an architect's vision, optimism, and supreme arrogance.
In Praise of Bad Readers
In a time of war, there is a danger in surveying the world as if it were a novel.
Trust the Kieran Culkin Process
First, he nearly dropped out of Oscar hopeful A Real Pain. Then he convinced Jesse Eisenberg to change the way he directs.
The Funniest Vampires on TV
What We Do in the Shadows is coming to an end. Its idiosyncratic brand of comedy may be too.
The Water-Tower Penthouse
Gigi Loizzo and Angel Molina's apartment on the Grand Concourse in the Bronx looks out on Yankee Stadium.
The Nobu You Don't Know
As he celebrates his downtown restaurant's 30th anniversary, Nobu Matsuhisa discusses the disaster and depression that nearly ended his career before it began.