Kimora Lee Simmons says fabulosity is "defined and redefined every day." It's about "triumph: I made it. It's success."
Kimora Lee Simmons is "Back in the Fab Lane," nearly 20 years after the debut of her original reality TV show.
Kimora Lee Simmons and her family, including daughters Ming Lee and Aoki Lee, are gearing up for more reality TV with E!'s "Kimora: Back in the Fab Lane."
Kimora Lee Simmons prides herself on being a mom and a mogul. "I'm a single mom. I have five kids," she says, adding, "I have a lot more kids on the side, really and truly. I know people say that, [but] I honestly do have 10 kids at least."

NEW YORK — "We have a problem."

A single scene in 2000s' era reality show "Kimora: Life in the Fab Lane" shows the unfiltered essence of Kimora Lee Simmons.

In the moment that has since resurfaced and gone viral on social media, Simmons rambles, "I'm having a really bad day. I'm trying to diet, I can't find a proper pill, the granola is not cutting it, I'm hungry, I don't know what to eat, I'm irritated. But I'm just not having a good day. I'm hot, honestly, I probably – because I don't eat. … I was on my period last week. I'm just a little flustered, OK?"

Now, Simmons sits in a Manhattan studio, rattling off a similar laundry list of qualms about the day – from her cardigan to her makeup – before pausing, adjusting to change the narrative back to one of positivity. It's all good in Kimora's world, which continues to be equal parts entirely relatable and incredibly aspirational.

The fashionista, business mogul, mom and reality TV pioneer is returning to the medium that helped make her a household diva with "Kimora: Back in the Fab Lane" (airing Tuesdays on E! at 10 p.m. ET/PT).

For "many years and I'd say 'no' or 'it's not the right thing' or 'it's too big of an ensemble situation,'" Simmons says of why she turned down other reality show offers.

"This is more my lane," Simmons tells USA TODAY. "This is where I belong. The timing was right."

A lot has changed for fashion trailblazer, whose clothing and lifestyle brand Baby Phat – and her fateful marriage to record exec and Phat Farm label creator Russell Simmons – launched her into the pop cultural zeitgeist of the aughts. With its minxy rhinestone cat logo and a roster of celebrity clients decked in puffer coats, tight jeans and baby tees, Baby Phat – and thus, Kimora – was a purveyor of quintessential Y2K style.

But Simmons, 50, is in a different era, one somehow defined again by the early '00s aesthetic and yet markedly more calm amid the lovable family chaos surrounding her.

"Fabulosity," she once said, "It's a state of being." Now fabulosity is "defined and redefined every day," she says. "For me, it's triumph: I made it. It's success."

Kimora Lee Simmons: From Baby Phat to 'Back in the Fab Lane'

Her lore is well documented: Discovered in her hometown of St. Louis, Missouri, the tall, biracial tween made an early mark in fashion at 13 modeling for Karl Lagerfeld's Chanel before hitting the runways for Fendi, Valentino, Armani and more. Just shy of turning 18, she met Russell Simmons, whom she went on to marry in 1998 and started a lucrative (read: reported billion-dollar) cultural empire with the Def Jam cofounder that expanded beyond hip-hop scions to fashion moments for stars like Beyoncé, Madonna, Britney Spears, Aaliyah and more. (The couple divorced in 2009.)

"It's iconic," she says, reminiscing on Baby Phat's impact (she puts Diana Ross on her Baby Phat styling bucket list). "It's phenomenal. … It was just a culmination of all of the hottest stuff. And that to me was my version of the American Dream."

Her impact in fashion reached mainstream audiences with the debut of "Life in the Fab Lane" in 2007, which flaunted her life as a mogul mom and ran for four seasons.

It was part of a fast-paced trajectory, she says: "I got married very early. I got divorced very early. I had children very early. I started a business very early."

Those early developments positioned Simmons to be the businesswoman she is today. She has ownership stake in energy drink Celsius, and she purchased Baby Phat in 2019, nearly 10 years after she stepped down as president and creative director. With her return to the "Fab Lane" nearly 20 years after the original show, she has a singular message for her fans.

"I want to uplift people," Simmons says. "I want to help them grow and do things. I want to help them see themselves in the things that I'm doing, or [in] the things that they want to do that are like some of the things I'm doing. … I want them to see themselves in me."

Kimora Lee Simmons' kids, family dynamic bring light to 'Back in the Fab Lane'

Simmons' most rewarding role is that of "mom" to her household of kids: daughters Ming, 25, and Aoki, 23, and sons Kenzo, 16, Gary, 16, and Wolfe, 10; she also has a "bonus son," 19-year-old Jayden, a former classmate of her son's who moved in with the family.

"I'm a single mom. I have five kids," she says, adding, "I have a lot more kids on the side, really and truly. I know people say that, [but] I honestly do have 10 kids at least."

That includes Jessie and D'Lila Combs, the 18-year-old twin daughters of her late friend and former model Kim Porter and disgraced music mogul Sean "Diddy" Combs.

"We live very close to each other, literally walking distance across the street," Simmons says. "We're very, very close. I have my eye on them, as I have since they were born. I was in the room when they were born. I love them. I'm so proud of them."

She also has a host of animals in her care, including Porter's black Pomeranian, Callie. Fans of the original show will see Ming and Aoki all grown up, now young models jetsetting the globe. Simmons admits she's "not the best person with archiving my photos," but the new show "is helping me do that. And these clips are helping me see some of my baby moments. … It's like having a living photo album."

But Simmons won't "watch myself on TV a lot. … Every once in a while I'll catch a clip," especially if it features one of her kids.

Simmons doesn't recall some of those early TV moments, including telling her kids that mommy could buy anything that daddy could, too. "I didn't even know that I said it, but it's absolutely correct. It's right," she says.

"And look at me now. And then I don't know, where's the dad? Don't know. What's he doing? Not much. So there must've been some inherent reason there" for that advice to her kids, she says.

But she quickly adds: "I don't mean that in any kind of way to somebody. Don't edit it like that. If you're going to say it, put the whole thing because Lord knows I don't need any more drama from these folk. But look at our lives. You can say that it speaks for ourselves and what we do. I'm a dedicated mom, parent. I step in in any way I need to, and I can't say that for other people."

Is she in contact with the fathers of her children, Russell Simmons, Djimon Hounsou and Tim Leissner?

"No, not so much," she says diplomatically. "No, not really at all. No, they're not really in my life. And we don't – yeah, no. And not because of me. Because of them."

She adds: "I try to foster the best that I can [between] relationship and environment, but sometimes it takes two to tango, and they don't always tango. So it's not really co-parenting at the moment. It's like, no, I'm parenting. I'm both parents right now."

Simmons says her kids "are with me 99.9% of the time. Very rarely do they see the other parent. They do a little bit. But like I say, that relationship is theirs to have, not mine to interfere with," she says. "I want the best, but I definitely keep my little chickies all in a brood. So regardless of how that turns out on any given day, I know that they'll be OK because they have support and they have family. They say it takes a village – and my kids definitely have a village."

As for her "fabulosity," it continues to be "a way of life, a way of being, an inner strength, an inner beauty," Simmons says, "knowing that you can do it when lots of people said you couldn't. I'm here to tell you that you'll be OK when lots of people said you wouldn't. It's that spirit, that fighting spirit."

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Kimora Lee Simmons returns to reality TV – 'This is where I belong'

Reporting by Anika Reed, USA TODAY / USA TODAY

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