Lauren Chan has completed rather a lot in her versatile profession. Along with being a former Glamour editor, the size-inclusivity advocate launched a clothes model and have become a profitable plus-size mannequin. However what’s occurring this week is one thing she admittedly did not see coming: She is the most recent Sports activities Illustrated mannequin, and she or he’s celebrating by popping out within the Swimsuit Situation.
In response to a press launch, Chan is the primary brazenly queer plus-size Sports activities Illustrated Rookie. (“Rookie” is what they name first-time Swimsuit Situation fashions.) However remarkably, the difficulty serves Chan’s announcement that she’s a lesbian — solely these closest to her knew of her what she calls a “late” coming-out earlier than this.
Chan penned an unreserved editorial for the difficulty known as “How I Got here Out, Acquired Divorced, and Landed in SI Swimsuit” — and it actually does cowl all that and extra, together with parts of her journey as a plus-size mannequin and the way the pandemic led her to remedy and consequent revelations.
“In my early classes, I found that one thing in my psychological code had brought on me to repress my emotions, and subsequently, my sexuality,” she writes. “When it grew to become plain that I felt solely interested in ladies, I knew I needed to inform my husband.”
It could appear ironic to come back out as a lesbian in what’s traditionally been thought-about one of the male-gaze-y publications, however Chan sees it as the proper alternative to assist proceed transferring the Sports activities Illustrated Swimsuit Situation in a refreshing new path. “Right here looks like the fitting place to have a good time my exhausting fought satisfaction, relate to folks in my place, and maybe change some individuals’s view of the queer neighborhood,” she writes.
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