HAVE you noticed the number of proud, rich daddies in the front row at fashion shows? Is it coincidence or conspiracy that A) they’ve put money into fashion and B) their daughters are some of today’s hottest models?We asked three of fashion’s daddies and daughters to spill the beans.
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Model daughter: Ivanka Trump
Age: 16
Her relationship to fashion: Model for the Next agency
Daddy’s name: Donald Trump
Age: 53
Occupation: Real estate mogul (said to be worth $5 billion)
His fashion interests: Trump Modeling Group, a new modeling agency; sitting front row at fashion shows that his daughter stars in
Ask Donald Trump if his daughter Ivanka’s burgeoning modeling career has made him more interested in taking stake in the fashion world and he demurs. “You know, I was doing things in fashion much earlier than Ivanka,” he says. “I’ve always been very much involved in that world – even though it’s an evil, vicious one.”Still, no one can deny that it was after Ivanka, 16, began her modeling career three years ago that Trump truly became a front-row fashion show staple. Models just don’t remember him in the front row with quite the same consistency back then.Since her runway debut, Ivanka’s dad has purchased several high-profile beauty pageants – the Miss Teen USA contest, which Ivanka co-hosted last year, among them. Then, in January, he spent $20 million to launch Trump Modeling Group (TMG), an agency that represents models like Tatjana Patitz as well as photographers, hair and clothing stylists, and makeup artists.Will Ivanka remain at her old agency, Next, or join her doting dad at TMG?The Donald says she’ll stay put. “It would be such a conflict of interests if she worked for me,” he says. “I think it’s easier in terms of my relationship with her [for her not to come over].”
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Model daughter: Kidada Jones
Age: 24
Her relationship to fashion: Tommy Jeans model
Daddy’s name: Quincy Jones
Age: 66
Occupation: Legendary music producer, owner of Qwest Records
His fashion interests: Buddies with Tommy and Andy Hilfiger: Qwest collaborates with the latter’s AH! Entertainment, an agency that represents music groups
Kidada Jones says she would not have a modeling career had she not been born to famous parents. (Her mome is ex-“Mod Squad” beauty Peggy Lipton.”People say all the time you have to know someone in the biz to get somewhere,” she says. “It’s totally bull-crap, I know, but it’s true.”This is a brutal, cruel business, and the reason I am doing what I do is because [moving among famous, fabulous folks] is familiar and comfortable to me,” the 24-year-old says. “I mean, I’m not tall, and I don’t really look like a model.”In fact she may be doing herself a disservice.Kidada got into modeling five years ago, while she was working in the publicity department at Tommy Hilfiger. There, she became close to Andy, Tommy’s younger hipster brother. Together, Kidada and Andy pitched Tommy the concept of a streetwear line. Tommy Jeans was the result. When it came time to find a face for the new brand, Kidada was chosen; She’s since appeared in four ad campaigns for the brand. (Currently, Kidada is supplementing her career as an actress: the movies “Black & White” and “Thicker Than Water” both open this year.)Not one to keep her dad at arm’s length (she’s senior director of artist management at Jones’ label Qwest), Kidada also served as the link between her dad and the Hilfiger brothers’ fashion/music empire. “I introduced my dad to the Hilfigers early, early on,” says Kidada, who was speaking from her car phone in Los Angeles, where she lives most of the time. It wasn’t long before Quincy buddied up with Andy,Now, Andy’s company, AH! Entertainment, is working in conjunction with Quincy’s label, which is a subsidiary of Warner Brothers Records.”We’re just like a big old family,” says Kidada. “Hilfiger events are like family functions.”
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Model daughter: Devon Aoki
Age: 16
Fashion status: Model for the Storm agency in London, Women in New York
Daddy’s name: Rocky Aoki
Age: 60
Occupation: Owner of the popular Benihana restaurant chain – which, last year raked in $119.1 millionHis fashion interests: Creating a perfume in honor of his lovely daughter
Restaurateur Rocky Aoki’s voice rises in timbre when he talks about seeing his daughter Devon in designer Anna Sui’s fall fashion show. “She did such a great job – I almost cried,” remembers Rocky, owner of the Benihana group. “She was the smallest one.”Indeed, Devon, whose looks display a truly exotic mix of Japanese, German and British heritage, stands just an inch shorter than Kate Moss, the prototypical waif who “discovered” her. Fashion lore has it that just two years ago, Moss saw Devon’s picture in an Interview magazine spread (fashionable friends of Devon’s mother, Pam Price, had chosen the then inexperienced model to appear in a shoot for the downtown style tome) and brought her to the attention of the Storm modeling agency.Devon’s multimillioniare dad is so proud of his daughter’s rise to modeling fame that he was beside her as she inked her deal to become the new face of Helena Rubinstein. He is also currently in the process of shopping a deal to create a “Devon” perfume. Devon, he explains, does not want to rely on the modeling business alone: She wants to pursue other projects. “So I said, ‘What about a perfume?’ ”Also, he says, it’s a tribute to her beauty and popularity. His daughter will return the favor by hosting a high-profile 35th anniversary party next month for the Benihana chain.Now 16, Devon has since balanced studying for her high school courses with modeling in fashion shows for the prestigious likes of Yohji Yamamoto. She recently shot ad campaigns for Versus and Chanel (she’s the new favorite of Karl Lagerfeld, the fickle head of that couture label), and has become so popular that, according to our own Page Six, last show season some designers complained her rate was too high!