When Mom Is a Gearhead

Growing up on the Palos Verdes Peninsula, Leslie Carlson couldn’t have cared less about horses--or cheerleading, for that matter. “Dude, I was always going off to the car shows with my dad and brother. I had no time for girlie things.”

Now 37, Carlson still lives in Palos Verdes and she’s still haunting the car shows. Don’t look to Carlson for the latest offerings from Tom Ford or Jean Paul Gaultier. Her idea of a design icon is legendary “kustomizer to the stars” George Barris of Barris Kustom Productions in North Hollywood. A former ad executive who is now a full-time mom, Carlson runs errands in a gargantuan black 5.7-liter V8 2000 Chevy Suburban emblazoned with electric blue hot-rod flames to go with its customized suspension.

For autos no less than fashion ensembles, accessories make the look. Wheels? Budnik is de rigueur, says Carlson. Exhaust system? Custom Flowmaster muffler. Welded roll pan? Shaved-off roof rack? Forget South Coast Plaza. Carlson’s fashion dollar goes to such temples of style as Foreign Auto Body in Gardena, the source of that flame job. “My mom still has to drag me off for proper clothing,” she says. “I wear jeans, T-shirts and Doc Martens all the time.” Her lone fashion concession is a pair of Sha Sha’s black with blue flames that match the truck. “They were on the news,” she says, raising her eyebrows. “Supposedly, they’re drug shoes. Check it out.” Sure enough, inside the shoe is a small compartment in the sole. “Wild, huh?”

But surely, one wonders, Carlson dressed for success during her executive years? Nope. “I had all the car accounts,” says Carlson, who married an advertising media director. “It was more important to know cars than to wear the right clothes.” Move over, ladies who lunch--soccer mom 2002 is here, and she’s taking no prisoners. “My car is my statement.”