Paris Hilton: from party girl to style icon

Dubbed the “OG Influencer,” club kid- turned- mogul Paris Hilton pioneered becoming “famous for being famous,” in the early 2000s, a playbook since adopted by everyone from the Kardashians to Housewives and countless social media influencers.

In her 20s, her fame became mainstream with the nearly simultaneous debut of her reality show “The Simple Life,” and the leak of a scandalous sex tape.

“I knew I wasn’t trying to build an ordinary career,” Hilton recalls of her early days of being paid to party and attract the paparazzi. “I was building a brand that would eventually turn into multiple income streams … but that sounds way more calculated than it was.”

Born into the family dynasty of hotel magnate Conrad Hilton, Hilton spent her childhood in a rarefied world of privilege, collecting a menagerie of animals like ferrets, gerbils and a baby goat and earning the family nickname of “Star.”

After Hilton started sneaking out at night to go to clubs, her parents sent her to a series of schools for troubled teens, with devastating consequences. Hilton says she was psychologically and physically abused and sexually assaulted.

She didn’t open up about the abuse for 20 years, finally discussing it in her 2020 Youtube documentary “This is Paris.” Since then, she’s become an advocate for reform in the “troubled teen” industry, testifying before Congress about her experience.

Now embracing her ADHD as her “superpower,” these days Hilton focuses on being a mogul with a perfume and jewelry line and other ventures, with a legion of fans she calls her “Little Hiltons.”