Search Belles

Apparently voting has closed for the model search. My pick, Manuela Hernandez, had a good showing.

But for some reason, her pics didn’t live up to her search photoshoot.

Where her model search shots are sultry, making her look so hot that water beads on the surface of her body...

...her SI shots are a little more straightforward, even tame somehow.


I think this might be the Emrata Effect. You take a model who flourishes in dirty, sultry, even campy scenarios…

…and try to turn her into a sunshiny bathing beauty…

…and you end up with a little cognitive dissonance. The thing that made her sexiest doesn’t perfectly translate to the new venue.

That said, I think it’s true of all the contestants. The stark, color-saturated photography and the sleek, black bikinis created a cool and specific mood that doesn’t come through in the girls’ magazine appearances.

Manuela

Jessica

Raine

Brooks

Erin

I assume we’ll hear who won soon, and then we can notch the first rookie for 2020.

Stay tuned!

Let’s Just Do It and Bikini Legends

So I recently watched the Netflix Fyre Fest documentary. I highly recommend it, if you haven’t seen it yet, which you probably have. It’s kind of astonishing what a clusterfuck it was from day one.



In any case, the doomed festival introduced itself to the world with some viral videos of top models frolicking on the beach in bikinis, including several SI girls.

Let us dedicate this week’s Topless Tuesday to the girls of the Fyre Festival. What’s the metaphor here… Massive failures start from the top down? Fraud will eventually be exposed? They should have anticipated failure and nipped it in the bud? Whatever. Here are Chanel, Emily, Hannah, Lais, and Rose.

And what the heck. Sharp-eyed viewers will probably catch a photo of Gigi during an early scene about the Fyre talent-booking app. Come join us, Gigi!

She may not have been in that promo video, but she’s adjacent to someone who was.

Calendar Girls, Revisited: 1991 Part 1

Kathy Ireland was busy in 1991. She welcomed no fewer than three future SI swimsuit models into the world.

First off was Samantha Hoopes on February 10.

Then came Emily Didonato two weeks later, on February 24.

Michaela was the calendar girl as Emrata arrived.

And then Maria von Hartz celebrated the arrival of 2019 rookie Jasmine Sanders.

There are too many girls for all their names to fit in the "Labels" section, which is a dumb reason to split 1991 into two posts unless you're some kind of obsessive who wants to make sure each model is listed and searchable, so here we are.

Getting to the Bottom of Things

I realized something important.

Nina Agdal’s 2017 “vajazzle” is essentially Carolyn Murphy’s 2006 bikini bottom, without the bikini bottom.

• • •

In other swimsuit news, Emily Ratajkowski has been accused of swiping Lisa Marie Fernandez’s designs for her swimwear line.

Specifically, this segmented one-piece:

And this bikini top:

I’ve studied the matter at great length, and I think Lisa Marie has a case.

In Memoriam

Farewell to the five non-rookies who did not return for 2016.

Emily Ratajkowski

I was surprised she came back for a second year, so I’m not surprised she didn’t reappear for 2016. She was always good for some sexy shots. But something ineffable kept her from “feeling” like an SI girl to me.

• • •

Sara Sampaio

This one hurts. Sara was easily one of my favorite models from the last two years. Beautiful eyes, magnificent body. Her time is over way too soon. I hope against hope SI isn’t done with her permanently; it’s rare but not unheard of for a model to take a year or two off, then return.

• • •

Ariel Meredith

For example: Ariel first appeared in 2009, then returned in 2012. I thought she had a great run, with 2012 and 2014 especially yielding some of my favorite pictures from the last few years.

• • •

Genevieve Morton

She was one of the longest-serving models and had become a reliable staple. She had a fun, kewpie doll presence she brought to the magazine, and it almost feels incomplete without her.

• • •

Jessica Gomes

Jessica spent some time as my favorite model in SI. She gave us eight magnificent years, and the swimsuit issue has a Gomes-shaped hole in it.

That’s the Way the Rookie Crumbles 2015

With a whopping twelve rookies introduced in 2014, someone had to slip away in 2015. I am actually surprised at how many did stick around. Seven: more than half of them.

We lost the entire Netherlands subcommittee: Bregje, Marloes, and Valerie. I expected at least one of them to stick around. Marloes was the swimsuit-model-lookingest girl of the bunch. And Bregje had those eyes. (And that one-piece.)

The most surprising return for me was Samantha Hoopes. Sexy, obviously. But she seemed like a very straightforward blonde-with-big-boobs, if that makes sense. (Though I suppose “blonde with big boobs” never hurt anyone’s chances in the swimsuit issue.)

Samantha has a pretty 2015, by the way.

I also thought Emily Ratajkowski was going to completely distance herself from SI, but she’s back.

I’m sad to lose Cris, but I believe she had a baby. And Lauren had loads of potential, in my opinion.

In any case, we now have seven rookies to watch. My predictions, from most likely to least likely to return:

1) Kelly (would probably be #2 if she hadn’t just gotten ROTY)
2) Hailey
3) Rose
4) Erin
5) Robyn
6) Solveig
7) Ashley

We’ll find out in a year!

Rookies crumbling 2013, 2012, 2011.