Bianca Espada Isn't the Rich Girl You Love To Hate
With a dramatic, "unscripted" television series under her belt, Bianca Espada has an explanation for all of it, and a drastically different history behind her "Rich Kids" persona.
Before she made her debut on E!'s now defunct "Rich Kids of Beverly Hills" in May 2016, NY Post’s Page Six had already picked up on Bianca's sharp tongue, convincing readers that she was bratty and vapid, making her an excellent addition to a show about privileged twenty-somethings who live in a different financial stratosphere.
We probably would have accepted the one-sided description of Bianca on Page Six in addition to the highly-edited portrayal of Bianca on E! as truth. But after interviewing her, we found out that all that glitters on Bianca isn't made of gold.
The first question that comes to mind when learning about Rich Kids is, do they even work?
"I'm an assistant to a personal shopper in New York," Bianca said of her boss Sonya Benson, Rihanna's streetwear guru and personal friend. Since working with the Barney's celebrity stylist, Bianca's style has evolved from Hervé bodycon dresses and Chanel bags to Adidas tracksuits and snow-white sneakers.
"I've always loved fashion but [Sonya] has given me a different outlook on functional fashion. Before, I was always spending my money on shoes and bags and things that you wear for 5 minutes...and now I wear flat shoes," she told BTI.
Fashion aside, there's more to her story than sartorial evolution.
For starters, unlike some of her Rich Kids peers, Bianca wasn't born with a Tiffany’s spoon in her mouth. Her luxe lifestyle began when she was adopted at age 3 by her stepfather.
"I had a birth dad that didn't want me, and I had this amazing dad that did want me," Bianca revealed to BTI. “I don’t think [my birth dad] was ready to be a dad, and I don't think he knew what he was getting into. We have a relationship, but it's weird—we don't talk that much. He was involved in my life a little bit when I was younger. He's come to see me once in a blue moon, and then I didn’t talk to him for about 12 years"
Those 12 years of silence ended when Bianca, still in high school, accompanied her stylist mom to Louis Vuitton for a client by chance.
"As I'm walking into the store, I walk by this guy who looks like me. I can't explain the feeling–it wasn't an out-of-body experience, but it was the craziest feeling that I could recall–and it was my dad," Bianca said. "I hadn’t seen him in 12-13 years, and we looked at each other, and I think we immediately knew who the other person was."
About a month later, she got a letter in the mail from him.
“Dear Bianca, I was in Los Angeles last weekend, I might have walked past a girl that could have been you.”
And that's how the estranged father and daughter rekindled their relationship. She went so far to keep the relationship a secret from her mother that she ended up having two cell phones, one for her father and one for her other parents. After her mom discovered her second Sidekick (#tbt) and other exorbitant gifts from him, 16-year-old Bianca had to come clean about her birth dad.
"It really hurt my mom, and I don't blame her," she said. "But I was so afraid of hurting my dad who raised me that I didn’t know what to do, and I was too young to come to terms with it, so I think that hurt him as well, and I regret that."
Bianca said that aside from the drama of it all, her birth dad ended up showing his true colors, "and it was like...my mom was right about him, but I had to figure that out by myself, and so we talk here and there occasionally, but...he's not a dad."
The fairy-tale story of how Bianca and her mom came to end up with Prince Charming has influenced the Rich Kid in more ways than she can count.
Bianca has a star quality that makes men want to date her, and women want to be her friend. Here's more of what she had to say.
BTI: How do you think your life would have been different if you didn't have the dad who raised you?
Bianca Espada: I wouldn't have anything I have today. I think he's influenced me 100 percent. I was raised in such a traditional household. My mom didn't work. My dad took care of my mom. And that's what I look for in a man. Someone who's successful, has a great job, and has a great lifestyle. In another interview, I was asked, "could you ever date someone that was poor?" Honestly, not really. No. It's going to be a struggle. There has to be something really amazing about them.
BTI: Speaking of your relationships with men, are you dating anyone?
BE: I'm so picky finding someone that I like for an extended amount of time. I date people, but I also don't publicize my relationships. I think if you really like someone and care about them, any relationships that's going to be on TV is destined to fail, and there's going to be so many haters and so many people talking sh*t. I just don't like to publicize it unless I'm married, but I’m not. So I’m not going to put their life on blast.
BTI: What do you look for in a guy?
You have to be tall. You have to speak more than one language. I think you just have to be more sophisticated and more worldly. I want someone who can teach me things. I'm tired of teaching people. I want someone who's down to dress up and go to a black tie event, but who can have just as much fun at an In-N-Out drive through.
BTI: What do you look for in friends?
I have very good friends, and I'm very lucky to have the friends that I have. I think that all my friends are pretty similar in that none of them are malicious, none of them are mean, and they're not going to backstab you or talk sh*t.
That’s how my friendships are. And if someone has helped me out in life, I always want to do the same.
BTI: You’re surprisingly calm.
I'm not a fighter; I avoid conflict like the plague. I've never really fought with any of my friends, to be honest with you. I’m not the type to make something about petty sh*t, but if you don’t defend yourself on a TV show, you come off as weak, and I'm not a weak person, but I also...I'm not a bitch.
BTI: You’re hard to become friends with though…
Yeah, I don't like new friends because it takes me a long time to trust somebody, and letting someone in and trusting them is a big deal to me. I've been f***ed over by friends before I'm not going to let it happen again. As you get older you don’t have time for that in your life. I have enough friends. If you're dope and I really like you then we can absolutely be friends, but it's rare.
BTI: What are some misconceptions about you?
I think it's like... that I’m a bitch. But honestly, I just defend my friends. If someone messes with my friends, I'm the first one to defend them and be there for them. I think my sticking up for what I believe in and sticking up for my friends on the clips of [Rich Kids of Beverly Hills], portrays me as a bitch...but I'm actually lovely.