Swimsuit

Twelve Gorgeous Photos of Tyra Banks in the Bahamas

The supermodel and business mogul made her debut in 1993.

Cara O’Bleness

Tyra Banks Legends: Swimsuit 2014

Legendary supermodel Tyra Banks made her SI Swimsuit debut in 1993 when she was photographed by Walter Ioos Jr. in the Florida Keys. Banks has been featured on the cover of the magazine three different times, most recently in 2019 when photographer Laretta Houston took her picture in Great Exuma, a district in the Bahamas.

The 49-year-old model created the hugely successful show America’s Next Top Model, which ran for 24 seasons between 2003 and ’18, and uncovered talents like Yaya DaCosta, Lio Tipton and Winnie Harlow.

In 2020, Banks joined Dancing With the Stars as a host and returned for her third season this fall alongside co-host Alfonso Ribeiro.

Banks, who made history when she was the first Black woman to appear on the SI Swimsuit Issue cover in 1996 (alongside Valeria Mazza), landed her first solo cover the following year in ’97.

“I remember the first time that I saw the cover that I was on by myself, which to me was the ‘Oh my God moment,’” she said. “I was driving up to the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit party... and I thought that they were going to show me the cover in their hands. There was my cover blown up like two, three stories high... and I just started crying.”

Banks shared that she was in the car with her mom and dad when she saw the individual cover for the first time and was blown away by the magnitude of the moment.

“This was something that I never thought would ever happen, at least not to me, to be a Black woman on the cover of Sports Illustrated Swimsuit edition,” she continued. “This is Americana, this is not about color, it’s just about being a female... Every facet in trying to break down barriers, for whether it’s race, whether it’s color, whether it’s sexual orientation, everything counts. So to me, being on the cover meant, wow, model is model, beauty is beauty, girl is girl, and I was like, young girls everywhere are going to look at that and go, ‘Wow! Tyra kinda looks like me and they put me on that cover, maybe that means that I’m beautiful.’”

Below are 12 of our favorite images from Banks’s 2019 photo shoot in Great Exuma.

Tyra Banks
Tyra Banks
Tyra Banks
Tyra Banks
Tyra Banks
Tyra Banks
Tyra Banks
Tyra Banks
Tyra Banks
Tyra Banks
Tyra Banks
Tyra Banks
Published
Cara O’Bleness
CARA O’BLENESS

Cara O’Bleness is a writer and editor on the Lifestyle and Trending News team for SI Swimsuit. Prior to joining SI Swimsuit in 2022, she worked as a writer and editor across a number of content verticals, including food, lifestyle, health and wellness, and small business and entrepreneurship. In her free time, O’Bleness loves reading, spending time with her family and making her way through Michigan’s many microbreweries. She is a graduate of Michigan State University’s School of Journalism.

Home/SwimNews