Sources
Help build the largest human-edited directory on the web.
Submit a site - Become an editor
Wikipedia. Licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.
Are you an expert in this subject? Join the discussion and share your knowledge at Wikipedia.org.
Kimora Lee Simmons
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Kimora Lee Simmonns | |
|---|---|
| Birthdate: | May 3, 1975 (age 31) |
| Birth name: | Kimora Perkins |
| Height: | 6 ft 0 in (1.83 m) |
| Eye color: | Brown |
| Hair color: | Black |
| Orientation: | Straight |
| Ethnicity: | African-American, Japanese, Korean |
| Official Website | |
Kimora Lee Simmons (born Kimora Perkins on May 3, 1975 in St. Louis, Missouri) is a retired supermodel, the head of design for Baby Phat, and occasional actress.
Contents |
Simmons is the daughter of a Japanese-Korean mother[1][2] named Joanne Perkins[3] after she was adopted by an American family (now calls herself "Kyoko"[4]); and an African American father named Vernon Whitlock Jr., a former federal marshal who after serving time in jail, is now a barber in St. Louis [5].
Growing up in the lower-middle class St. Louis suburb of Florissant, she was very self-conscious about being biracial. Other children called her "Chinky giraffe" because of her height and Asian ethnic ancestry. When she grew to 5-foot, 8-inches by the time she was ten years old, she became the easy target of schoolyard taunts and teasing. With no Asian population in her community, she also had difficulty fitting in with other African-American students who accused her of being white. Hoping to boost her confidence, Simmons's mother enrolled her daughter in a modeling class when she was eleven years old. Two years later, at the age of thirteen, Simmons was awarded an exclusive modeling contract with Chanel, and just after her fourteenth birthday, she boarded a plane for Paris to work under the tutelage of famed Chanel designer Karl Lagerfeld. Simmons quickly gained attention in the fashion world when Lagerfeld closed his haute-couture show with Simmons, who strutted down the runway decked out as a child bride. "Everything people thought was weird about me before," Simmons told People Weekly, "was now good" [6]. By age 14, she had grown to a height of six feet, and became a self-professed muse for Chanel's Karl Lagerfeld.She and Karl Lagerfeld's three other fashion models Bernadette Jurkowski, Shoshanna Fitzgerald and Olga Sobolewska were dubbed "the four Karlettes". However, once Karl Lagerfeld had transformed her into one of the world's top fashion models, he resented her attitude and called her a $5,000-tote-bag- wearing monster. She is a graduate of Lutheran North High School in St. Louis County, Missouri.
On July 29, 2004, Simmons was arrested outside her estate in Saddle River, NJ and charged with possession of marijuana under 50 grams, eluding police, careless and imprudent driving, and driving with a broken brake light. The arrest was made after a two-mile chase that began near the Saddle River Police Station.
On December 20, 1998, she married hip-hop mogul Russell Simmons. The Simmons' have two daughters: Ming Lee Simmons, born January 21, 2000, and Aoki Lee Simmons, born August 16, 2002, both of whom model for Baby Phat Kids Collection. Russell Simmons filed for divorce in March 2006, saying the couple had split some time before.
In the fall 2006, Kimora and Russell Simmons ended their marriage[7] but still work together on Phat Farm and Baby Phat clothing lines.
She was cast as one of the celebrity judges on the reality series America's Next Top Model. A feud with Janice Dickinson forced her to leave the show after one season.
She appeared in the films Waist Deep [1] and Beauty Shop. [2], and also in Ginuwine's music video In Those Jeans.
Her first and thus far only book, Fabulosity, published by Judith Regan of HarperCollins's Regan Books, was released on February 21, 2006. Recently, Simmons has designed a new line of jewelry, called the Hello Kitty Collection. Simmons used the Sanrio Hello Kitty logo on the face of all of these new accessories.
She recently launched The Simmons Jewelry Company in partnership with M. Fabrikant and Sons, Inc.
Kimora Lee is a playable character in the PlayStation 2 video game Def Jam Fight for NY.
- ^ http://www.allhiphop.com/hiphopnews/?ID=5395 Simmons was born in St. Louis to a Black father and a Japanese-Korean mother.
- ^ http://www.kirkusreviews.com/kirkusreviews/search/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001737446 She came of age in St. Louis, not the friendliest of towns for a girl of Japanese, Korean and African-American descent.
- ^ http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0497686/bio Father Vernon Whitlock Jr is African-American and mother Joanne Kyoko Perkins is half Korean, half Japanese.
- ^ http://drinkthis.typepad.com/answer_this/joanne_kyoko_perkins/index.html
- ^ http://drinkthis.typepad.com/answer_this/vernon_whitlock_jr/index.html
- ^ http://www.answers.com/topic/kimora-lee-simmons
- ^ http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,1178541,00.html