One-Piece Wednesday: Irina Shayk, 2012

"We need someone crazy and sexy enough to wander around with a cheetah on a leash.""Call in Irina."

Looks like we can now identify the girl in this preview.And, we have another catsuit to go with Michelle's and Brooklyn's.

Once-Piece Wednesday: The 1977 Swimsuit Issue

Way back on the first One-Piece Wednesday, I mentioned the all-bikini 1997 issue and asserted that it was “an honor that will never be bestowed on one-piecers.”

I was wrong. It happened twenty years earlier.

I was virtually flipping through some old swimsuit issues online when I noticed something about 1977. Every suit in the magazine, including the cover, was a one-piecer. (Click on the “VIEW THIS ISSUE” link, and you’ll get a nifty interactive window.)At first, I figured that it was a coincidence, made possible by the more modest attitude and shorter pictorials of earlier swimsuit issues.

But then I read Jule Campbell’s introduction, under the headline “Tank Heaven for Not So Little Girls.”Annette Kellerman would love it. Tank suits—or racing suits, one-piece suits, maillots—are back. Not that they ever were away; it's just that this year they're what everyone, not only the Enders and Babashoffs, will be wearing. But Annette wouldn't recognize them. Even the new Speedo (above, $27) is super snug and snazzy.

This was only the 14th swimsuit issue, back when the magazine had a lot more “fashion” commentary.

(Annette Kellerman, by the way, was arrested in 1907 for wearing a one-piecer in public—scandalous at the time. A year later, she was named the Perfect Woman by Harvard because of her Venus de Milo body. Thanks, Wikipedia!)Cheryl Tiegs, in her sixth swimsuit issue, and despite appearing on the cover two years earlier, only appears in one photo:…which is slipped in under a couple photos of cover girl Lena Kansbod.There are four shots each of Lena and the refreshingly named Barbara Minty:Barbara (in that last pic, anyway) bears a striking resemblance to 2011 SI model contestant Tamiris Freitas.An entire issue dedicated to one-piecers. Who knew?

I feel confident we’ll never see the likes of it again. One-piecers are the giant pandas of the swimsuit issue. You’re just as likely to see models not wearing suits at all.But something warms my heart to know that three beautiful, sheathed models graced SI’s pages 35 years ago.

Lap Full of Caps

@SI_Swimsuit posted a link to a Gillette "Rookie to Cover" site from a year or two ago, where you can follow the journeys of Brooklyn Decker, Marisa Miller, Petra Nemcova, Veronica Varekova, and Rebecca Romijn from their first appearances in the magazine to their covers some years later.

One of the 2002 shots of Veronica shows her in her Dos Equis bottlecap bikini.
Now wait a second. When this pic was published, it looked like this:They edited out her bikini bottom.

I have spent nine years filled with sympathy for how painful that suit must have been to wear. And it was just more bikini bottom trickery from SI.

Here Comes the Bride, All Dressed in White

A belated congratulations to Molly Sims on her nuptials last week.I wonder if she got that diamond bikini she had on her registry.

White Swimsuit Week, 2011: Part Eight

We wrap up the week with Melissa Haro, who is 24 today.More on Melissa later this week.

White Swimsuit Week, 2011: Part Seven

The ultimate White Swimsuit Party was held for the 2006 cover.The ladies look great individually too (as evidenced by the hard-hitting journalism covering the shoot). So let’s enjoy them in chronological order of their first cover appearances.



Elle.

Rachel.

Daniela.

Rebecca.

Elsa.

Yamila.

Veronica.

Carolyn.

White Swimsuit Week, 2011: Part Six

I bemoaned the absence of Molly’s abs when she appeared in a recent One-Piece Wednesday. Let’s make up for it here.

White Swimsuit Week, 2011: Part Five

Naomi Campbell, pensive in white.

White Swimsuit Week, 2011: Part Four

Angie Everhart, rocking a white bikini.

White One-Piece Wednesday: Stacey Williams, 1993

Part three of White Swimsuit Week, as always, falls on One-Piece Wednesday. Here’s Stacey Williams.

White Swimsuit Week, 2011: Part Two

We continue with Christie Brinkley.

White Swimsuit Week, 2011: Part One

It is the week before Labor Day. That means we begin saying goodbye to summer, and it’s the last week you’re allowed to wear white. So let’s parade some white swimsuits while it is still legal to do so.



First, the aptly named Jessica White, from 2004.

2011 in Review

So, we’re half a year past the 2011 issue. Let’s take a look back.

Weirdest SuitsBrooklyn Decker’s lion design.
Damaris Lewis’s “groped-by-shadows” one-piece.
Kenza Fourati’s bikini bottom constructed of jimmies.
Oddest TrendCoral as decorative fan.
Toplessest GirlJessica White appears without her top in 9 of her 42 online photos, which is over 21%.
Most Amazing OutieIzabel Goulart’s bellybutton enters a room a few seconds before the rest of her does.
Most Titillating RevelationShannan Click has done some bondage photography, and not just in the suggestive way my sick brain tends to see.A couple years ago, she did some sort of artsy/kinky fashion spread for something called Exit magazine. (NSFW)
Early 2012 Cover Predictions?#3: Brooklyn Decker
#2: Julie Henderson
#1: Kate Upton

When You Ogle the Swimsuit, The Swimsuit Also Ogles You

Every so often, a face peers out from the body of a swimsuit model. This phenomenon can be anywhere on a spectrum from cute to disturbing.

Take this 1990 photo of Judit Masco and Akure Wall.The faces are big and friendly, cartoony and innocent. The overall effect is cute, emphasized by the models’ “speak no evil, hear no evil” poses.

Then there’s this. Michelle Lombardo from 2005, with a cat gazing from her bikini bottom.This is just as cutesy and cartoony as the previous photo, but I can’t help thinking there’s a visual pun here, one I can’t quite put my finger on, that keeps it from being categorized as “innocent.”

(In 2011, Brooklyn Decker took the cat imagery to a whole new level.)
Then we move on to Jessica White’s painted-on suit from 2009.A Pompeii-inspired pair of eyes glares a few feet south of Jessica’s. The effect is getting unsettling.

And then there’s Stacey Williams from 1998.13 years later, and I’m still scratching my head over this one. I’m all for Jesus, but as Courtney Love said in “The People vs. Larry Flynt,” “Nobody on this planet wants their religion and their porn mixed together.”

(That is Jesus, right? And Mary?)

It’s especially frustrating because Stacey is one of my all-time favorites. I frankly don’t think there are enough photos of her.

And one of them has a dose of Catholic guilt built right into it.

Hottest Bikini Shots

A couple months ago, the folks at Complex.com put together a list of the 50 Hottest Bikini Shots of All Time. Aside from a few inaccuracies (including a hazy idea of what constitutes a “bikini”), it’s a great list.



Predictably, there are lots of SI girls, and near the end of the list it’s almost a Tourette-style tirade of swimsuit issue covers.



#44: Paulina PorizkovaThey refer to this shot as coming from 1987, but it’s from 1985. My first swimsuit issue, seared in my memory.



#43: Christie BrinkleyThey list this as from 1975, but it's actually from 1981. It was good enough for SI to recreate it with Marisa Miller almost a quarter century later.

#41: Brooklyn DeckerThe only SI girl in a non-SI setting. Nice choice.

#34: Kathy IrelandFrom Complex’s description:

“This image was a cornerstone in Ms. Ireland’s career because it was a ridiculously long time coming for the S.I. vet. After 13 consecutive appearances in Sports Illustrated Swimsuit issues, she had finally earned a solo cover.”



Welllllll, 1992 was Kathy’s ninth consecutive year, not her thirteenth. (She was in twelve altogether.)



Also, she had her first solo cover three years earlier, in 1989 (the 25th Anniversary issue).



Finally, by specifying that she “finally” had a “solo cover,” they seem to imply that the cover she shared with Elle Macpherson and Rachel Hunter came out earlier than this one. In fact, it came out two years later, in 1994.



#32: Babette MarchStill a sexy photo. Babette is an artist with her own gallery now.

#30: Irina Shayk

#23: Elle Macpherson/Kathy Ireland/Rachel Hunter

#20: Niki TaylorNot what I’d call a bikini, but certainly a good choice for One-Piece Wednesday.



#18: Marisa Miller

#17: Elsa Benitez

#16:ValeriaMazza/Tyra Banks

#15: Cheryl TiegsYum. One of the giants on whose shoulders stand Irina, Marisa, Brooklyn, etc!



#14: Christie BrinkleyAnother pioneer. This may have been the skimpiest bikini on the cover to date (1981).



#12: Petra NemcovaEight years later, and she’s still adjusting those strings.



#6: Beyoncé

#2: Tyra BanksTyra’s intro to the all-bikini 1997 issue is the highest-rated SI bikini shot on the list. (I call for an asterisk, as #1 is Farrah Fawcett in a red one piece.)