Power & Beauty (22 page)
O
n the flight from New York to L.A., Beauty wondered about her new home. What awaited her? Her anticipation was especially great because of the background Anita had provided about Soo Kim. As the jet winged its way westward, Beauty remembered the fascinating details of that story. Over several evenings and several bottles of good wine, Anita had narrated the adventure with great relish.
Ten years ago, Soo Kim had come to New York to work at Bloom’s as a trainee under Anita Ward. She was a Korean American born in L.A. to fundamentalist Christians. Her parents owned a small dry-cleaning establishment on Olympic Boulevard near Western Avenue. Behind the dry cleaner was an apartment where the Kim family lived in three small rooms. Her parents were born in Seoul and never learned English. They read the
Korea Times,
watched Korean television, listened to Korean radio, shopped at Korean stores, and never left the all-encompassing world of Korean L.A. They took their children to church every Sunday and strictly supervised their every move. They wanted their daughter, Soo, who was seventeen years older than their son, Lee, to become a dentist or a doctor. Instead, in a quiet way, Soo reacted against her rigid upbringing and, after college at USC, went to New York to fulfill her dream as a designer. Her parents were aghast. But Soo assured them that she would come home in a few years, make a fortune, and buy the building that housed their dry cleaner. That way they’d no longer have to pay the exorbitant rent that hung over their heads every month. In the month that Beauty arrived, Soo celebrated her parents’ fortieth wedding anniversary by handing them the deed to the building. At thirty-five, she had made good on her promise, but not without the help of Primo Dalla Torre, a man whom her father and mother could barely tolerate.
When Soo had returned to California from New York, having learned all she could about retail fashion, she opened her own store in a midcity Sixth Street strip mall in a largely Korean neighborhood. Since she was bilingual and understood the tastes of Korean women, her idea was to travel to Seoul twice a year, buy the merchandise there at a good price, and cater to the local L.A. clientele. She borrowed a few thousand dollars from her parents, went into business, and, within a year, went broke. She thought her goods were conservative, but apparently they were not conservative enough. Soo had to admit that, try as she might, she couldn’t sell to her own people. Her tastes were simply too fashion-forward. She wanted to be a good girl and please her parents, but she was a rebel, and her rebellious nature prevailed, even when she tried to run a small dress shop. She was telling her customers what she thought they should wear, not what they themselves wanted to wear. It just didn’t work.
She decided instead to embrace her true self and begin a line of casual clothes aimed at an inner-city demographic that, though not quite ready to go the distance with post-punk fashion, was looking to separate themselves stylistically from an earlier generation. She thought of them, like herself, as half rebels, one foot in the present, one foot in the future. She tapped into the young artists’ communities all across Southern California and found inspiration from Chinese-American painters, Latin-American graffiti painters, black portrait painters, and even a Hungarian woman who designed wallpaper patterns to help her visualize a concept that was at once cool but calm. Thus Calm and Cool Clothing. Her first success was a silk-and-cotton sweatshirt featuring a golden leaf torn in half. She made retro T-shirts from organic cotton, recycled polyester, and rayon that featured Asian comic book characters. She designed oversized sweatshirts and sweatpants for young men that, though hinting of hip-hop, were rendered in patterns of plaids and argyles that gave the clothing a preppy flavor. In forging this new kind of cautiously edgy line, Soo consulted with Anita on a regular basis. Recognizing her desire to synthesize rather than revolutionize, Anita encouraged Soo and became her closest advocate. When it became apparent that Soo was ready to go national but needed a serious infusion of cash, it was Anita who put her in touch with Primo Dalla Torre.
Primo had homes in New York, Paris, Rome, and Milan. He was a venture capitalist with an interest in fashion. He had bought and sold two major luxury brands—a clothing retail chain and a leather goods manufacturer—at exactly the right time. He had modernized his father’s furniture plant, the foundation of his family’s fortune, reconfiguring the merchandise to sell to Target and Walmart. At fifty, his skin was darkly tanned from his frequent Caribbean getaways. He was a stocky man of medium height who was especially vain. He wore an expensive wig of dark curly hair. Because Anita had known Primo for years, she recognized the toupee the first time she saw it, but others presumed it was his natural hair.
Born in Venice but educated in England, he had only the slightest trace of an Italian accent. He had a short attention span, a love of sailing and water-skiing, and a strange attitude about women. Other than his immediate family, he interacted with European and American women only in a business context. He recognized the fact that many had keen business acumen and Primo was, above all, a businessman. Sexually, however, only Asian women interested him. Twice a year he made sure to schedule trips to the Pacific Rim. He told his colleagues that the trips involved important meetings, but they were really rendezvous with Asian women. He met them through high-level friends—often government officials—and the encounters were always discreet. He disclosed this fact to few people. Anita was one of the first.
“Your personal life is a mystery to me, Primo,” she said one afternoon over lunch at the Four Seasons on Park Avenue. “All I know is that you are not a cautious man.”
“I wouldn’t say that,” he said.
“Well, at least in business you are hardly cautious. It has been my observation that in business you are daring.”
“Is that why for years you’ve been daring me to buy Bloom’s?”
“That, and because if you do buy Bloom’s you’ll surely make me a first-tier executive.”
“As it stands, Anita, you are a first-tier buyer.”
“Not the same as someone who runs the place. And, as you well know, Bloom’s continues to be run poorly.”
“And yet their selling price is outrageous.”
“But not out of your price range.”
“The time isn’t right. Perhaps when I come back from Asia.”
“You’re always running off to Asia.”
“So I can conduct my private life in private.”
“Then it must involve Asian women.”
“Who are the most discreet, most understanding, most old-fashioned yet strangely modern of all women.”
“Are we discussing professional women?” Anita asked.
“And by professional you mean what?”
“Those who charge for their services.”
“Strange, Anita, but here in New York, for example, you can date a woman—what you would call a nonprofessional woman. You can spend five hundred dollars on dinner. You can take the lovely lady to a show where house seats cost a thousand dollars. At the end of the night, she may or may not submit to your advances. If not, another date is required. This time you gift her a bracelet, a necklace, a simple ring. This time you spend two thousand dollars. And with that, and the promise of more to come, she yields. In reality, aren’t you paying for her services just as surely as you pay for the woman who, from the beginning, lets you know that she is for sale?”
“You’re only talking about one particular kind of woman.”
“Well, I’m only one particular kind of man. I admit I want submission, but please, no games.”
“And your Asian women meet this criteria.”
“Indeed. They meet it with style. They shun endless conflicts and pointless discussions. They are able to separate the heart from the mind. They realize that the body controls the mind. And they are wonderfully skillful in giving and receiving bodily pleasure without the confusion of an emotional overlay.”
“It sounds so clinical. Like going to the doctor.”
Primo laughed. “A lady doctor perhaps.”
“And so,” said Anita, “your infamous private life excludes all women who have demonstrated talent in your world—the world of commerce—and includes only those women whose talents are demonstrated in the bedroom.”
“Essentially, yes.”
“And what if you find a woman whose talents are equally extravagant in both areas?”
“I’m not looking for such a woman but if, in fact, you know of one, please let me know. And, of course, it would help your case enormously if she were Asian.”
A few months later Soo came to New York looking for investors. Calm and Cool Clothing was selling nicely, but due to extremely slow payment from retailers, there was a decidedly negative cash flow. The venture had been undercapitalized from the start and now the situation was critical. Without a few hundred thousand to sustain her, Soo couldn’t continue.
“You need more than that, my dear,” said Anita, who understood virtually every aspect of the business. “To give yourself a fighting chance to make a mark, you need a cool million.”
“I don’t have those kinds of resources,” said Soo. “Where am I going to get that kind of money?”
Anita Ward took a long hard look at Soo Kim. She was certainly beautiful. She had long, luxuriant black hair that fell to her shoulders. Her small mouth and petite nose were placed perfectly on her thin, elegant face. She dressed with flair and individuality. She was a determined woman, but her determination was not apparent. Her drive was well hidden by her gentle approach. Her manners were exquisite. When she was Anita’s assistant there was no job, no matter how small, that she wouldn’t embrace. She liked to help people. She liked to serve. She kept her personal life private, but from a couple of things Soo had said in the past, Anita knew that she favored mature men.
“I have someone for you to meet, Soo,” said Anita. “But I think such a meeting would work better over a quiet dinner.”
“Whom do you have in mind?”
“Primo Dalla Torre.”
“
The
Primo Dalla Torre?”
“He’s a friend. He happens to be in the city this week. Shall I arrange it?”
Soo didn’t hesitate. “Please,” she said. “I’d be grateful.”
It worked. Primo was dazzled. Soo showed up in a red tunic worn over black silk pants, clothes of her own design. In conversation, she allowed him to take the lead. She answered his questions honestly and easily, and she asked him smart questions of her own. She spoke openly of her background and underplayed her independence. Having spent the day before reading about Primo on the Internet, she showed great familiarity with his many business dealings. He was flattered. He was smitten. He was aroused. He wanted her badly.
The cat-and-mouse game was on. The sole proprietor of Calm and Cool Clothing was calm and cool. She did not submit easily. When after dinner he suggested they have a drink in his suite at the Carlyle, she talked about the many meetings she had scheduled for the morning and her need to get a good night’s sleep. When he asked about her plans for the rest of the week in New York, she referred to her BlackBerry and said her schedule was crowded but, if he were interested in her business plan, she would certainly make meeting him again a priority. He said he was.
Their second meeting took place at the bar of the Mandarin Oriental Hotel thirty-five stories above Columbus Circle. They sat by an enormous window overlooking a cityscape cast in the romantic light of a rainy afternoon. Soo was prepared. She had a five-year plan carefully detailing the expansion of her business. She had a market analysis and profit projections. She put all this in a leather-bound presentation folder titled “A Calm and Cool Approach to Realizing the Potential of Calm and Cool Clothing.”
Primo was charmed and also convinced that she was among the sharpest businesswomen—not to mention the most talented designers—he had ever encountered. Rather than agree on the spot, though, he suggested that he come to Los Angeles for a closer look. She was most agreeable. She was flying back to California in a few days. He suggested that they make the coast-to-coast trip together in his Gulfstream G650 jet. Soo had no reason not to accept his generous offer.
Before boarding the sleek plane at Teterboro Airport in New Jersey, Soo considered her situation. She understood what Primo wanted. And of course she knew what she wanted. He was twenty years older than her but hardly an old man. He was vital and assertive and brilliant. He had a sexual energy that she did not find repellent. In her dealings with men, she had always been highly selective and extremely cautious. She had found her previous two boyfriends—both Korean Americans—perfectly adequate but not terribly exciting. Primo was exciting. It was exciting to travel with a billionaire in a private jet. It was exciting to be in the company of a man of powerful instincts and seemingly no fears. There was an animal magnetism about Primo Dalla Torre that Soo could not deny.
And yet she could continue to deny him, during the cross-country flight and even after their first evening in L.A., what he so desperately desired. She could do so not only because she was a woman of high standards and sturdy ethics, but also because she knew that it strengthened her position. The more he wanted her, the longer she made him wait, the more interested he became in Calm and Cool Clothing.
In the middle of the week of Primo’s stay in Los Angeles, Anita called from New York.
“How’s it going, my dear?” she asked Soo.
“He seems to like my plans. We toured a warehouse today that’s twice the size of the one I’ve been leasing. Primo is thinking of buying it. He’s interested in a real L.A. presence.”
“He’s interested in you,” said Anita.
Soo didn’t reply.
“Make certain this is a business-only trip,” Anita said insistently. “It’s important that you do that.”
“I agree,” said Soo. “That has always been my intention.”
Anita smiled. Soo was the perfect protégée.
Primo left Los Angeles without as much as an embrace from Soo. But she was careful to shake his hand warmly. He understood how she wanted to play it, and he went along. Back in Europe, he thought of her obsessively. He decided to back her plan and put in a million. They would become partners. Lawyers got involved. Papers were drawn. Negotiations were prolonged and hard-nosed. E-mails went flying back and forth. The principals—Soo and Primo—allowed their attorneys to do battle. They did not speak during this two-month period. Finally, the issues were resolved. Primo Dalla Torre became the majority owner of Cool and Calm Clothing. Soo Kim was managing partner and creative chief. He flew to Los Angeles to sign the papers and celebrate the collaboration. But it took another month and another trip for him to coax her into bed. As far as Primo was concerned, though, it was worth the wait. Soo was also well satisfied.