Kim Hastreiter
With partner David Hershkovits, Hastreiter is the co-publisher and co-editor of the painfully hip magazine Paper.
Raised in the bland, straight-laced suburbs of West Orange, New Jersey, Hastreiter discovered her artsy side in college and graduated from CalArts before moving to New York in 1976. After a stint at SoHo Weekly, the erstwhile arbiter of all things hip, she teamed up with former SoHo co-worker David Hershkovits and in 1984 the two founded Paper. Although Paper made an impression on downtown scenesters from the start, it was on precarious financial footing for years. For the first decade in business, Hastreiter didn't draw a salary and made ends meet by freelancing for magazines like Vanity Fair and GQ.
Despite Hasteiter and Hershkovits's advancing ages, it continues to function as something of a trade mag for the underground hipster scene, and it's their connection to this elusive demo that has helped turn the tide for Paper in recent years: Advertisers now look to Hastreiter for access to an audience of trend setters and pay a pretty price for doing so. In addition to being co-publisher of the magazine and the website, PaperMag.com, Hastreiter is fashion director and writes a long-running monthly style column and has written a few Paper-approved books. [Image via Getty]