Introducing 2023 SI Swimsuit Model Padma Lakshmi

The ‘Taste the Nation’ host, activist and best-selling author peels back the layers of her life.

Padma Lakshmi has everything cooking. (Pun intended.) Having begun her career as a model and actress, the culinary personality and TV host is a New York Times best-selling author, activist, producer and mother. Lakshmi is the host and executive producer of the Emmy Award–winning Bravo series Top Chef, which is now in its 20th season. Additionally, she is the host and executive producer of Hulu’s Taste the Nation, which explores the cuisines of various cultures and groups around the United States.

The multihyphenate is also an author of numerous cookbooks and a best-selling children’s book. Now she is adding another accolade to the list: Sports Illustrated Swimsuit model.

“Padma’s list of accomplishments is as stunning as she is and it’s an absolute honor to feature her in the 2023 issue,” says editor in chief MJ Day. “The importance of Padma’s presence here is multifold. She is here because she feels better than ever both inside and out. At 52, she has curated a life that represents who she authentically is: a powerful, beautiful, brilliant, accomplished woman in her prime. She can make the world look and listen and is here to remind us all that women can be all of these things and feel sexy AF. We will let the photos speak for themselves.”

Padma Lakshmi was photographed by Yu Tsai in Dominica. Swimsuit by Toxic Sadie Swimwear.

Yu Tsai/Sports Illustrated

As a model in the ’90s, Lakshmi had a day on the SI Swimsuit set in Dominica that was not anything new, but it truly was a day unlike any other. “From the first conversation to the fitting to every interaction I’ve had with MJ and everyone, they said this is about you feeling good and your comfort level,” the 52-year-old says. “I want everybody to see this pictorial and understand that sometimes a whole new phase that’s even more exciting than anything you’ve ever experienced before can happen well over 40.”

Fresh off filming the latest season of Top Chef, where she can go up two or three sizes by the end of shooting, she didn’t let her insecurities drive her decision—as per usual, she mentions—to say yes to getting in front of the camera in a bathing suit. “I love where I am in my life and know my body is not perfect by any means, but I feel beautiful. I feel like I have a very lucky, fruitful, productive life,” she says. “My thighs may have been leaner, and my boobs were probably slightly higher in earlier parts of my life, but I have never felt better about myself. I hope they see a full woman in all my facets and nuances and some contradictions. I wouldn’t go back to my 20s if you paid me all the money in the world.”

“Beauty is skin deep, but dumb and boring are to the bone”

Lakshmi, who immigrated to the U.S. from India with her single mom at the age of 4 and grew up in New York and then in the suburbs of Los Angeles, started modeling after college. “I really credit my mom because people did ask me if I would model when I was 17, and my mother said, ‘I don’t want you to do it. … If you’re pretty at 17, you’ll be more beautiful at 21 or 22,’” Lakshmi explains. “And you know, she was right. I’m so thankful that I had that kind of guidance and support around me.”

Padma Lakshmi was photographed by Yu Tsai in Dominica. Swimsuit by Toxic Sadie Swimwear.

Yu Tsai/Sports Illustrated

It’s the same wisdom she hopes to impart on her own daughter, Krishna, who is “the most important and biggest thing” in her life. The 13-year-old is Lakshmi’s guiding light on everything she does and, like any teenager, keeps mom on her toes. “She's my daughter. She sees me having fittings all day long. She sees me in glam before every event. She’s acutely aware of [the modeling] world and is interested in it,” she says. “I don’t want her to put that much focus on what she looks like. I try to tell her that your appearance is one part of you. Beauty is skin deep, but dumb and boring are to the bone.”

Instead, Lakshmi encourages her to pursue her artistic side. “She’s hugely talented as a musician, and so I’m trying to push her to work on those things,” she adds. Lakshmi has even rubbed off on her daughter when it comes to time spent in the kitchen, despite the teen not wanting to cook with her anymore. “I feel like my job as a parent, by the time she’s 18, she should know how to take care of herself, navigate public transportation, feed herself properly, have a cache of 12 recipes she can make for herself that are healthy and delicious,” she shares. “And also just think quick on her feet.”

Padma Lakshmi was photographed by Yu Tsai in Dominica. Swimsuit by Toxic Sadie Swimwear.

Yu Tsai/Sports Illustrated

“I feel more beautiful now because I hold that strength, and I hold the experience in my flesh, in my person and in my spirit”

At the age of 14, Lakshmi was in a car crash that resulted in a shattered right arm and fractured right hip. To this day, a seven-inch scar remains on her arm and has been a talking point for much of her life. The narrative around the scar has gone from causing her insecurities and agents passing on casting her to people not getting enough of it.

“Having Helmut [Newton] see me through his eyes and his lens and finding beauty in my scar really was a game-changer for me,” explains Lakshmi, who spent most of her 20s in Europe modeling. “I’m not just saying the light bulb went off and that was it, but when I stopped covering my scar and started wearing it proudly, that was the minute that everything changed. I learned a very important lesson as a young woman that beauty is arbitrary, and so is fashion. What’s important is that you feel beautiful no matter what. And that you understand that sometimes your—I’m not going to say weaknesses—your obstacles, and overcoming them can often be your strength. I feel more beautiful now because I hold that strength and I hold the experience in my flesh, in my person and in my spirit.”

Padma Lakshmi was photographed by Yu Tsai in Dominica. Swimsuit by Toxic Sadie Swimwear.

Yu Tsai/Sports Illustrated

Exuding this confidence doesn’t mean that Lakshmi hasn’t had her own bouts of imposter syndrome. Without restaurant cooking experience, she doubted whether she could host a food competition show or write a cookbook (she has written three). “In spite of imposter syndrome, I have still managed to carve out a corner of the universe for myself,” she says. “You just have to push through the fear. It’s always going to be there.”

The former actress says she would love to step back in front of the camera after 15 years away—if she could only find the time. “I was on the road every other week from the first of February all the way to August with Taste the Nation,” says the Love, Loss, and What We Ate: A Memoir author, who is in the process of writing another book. “I took a two-week break and took my daughter on holiday, and then from mid-August to October, I was filming Top Chef. I’m exhausted!”

Lakshmi acknowledges that there’s a constant balancing act. “You always hear, ‘Oh, you can have it all.’ Yeah, we can have it all, but you probably can’t have it all at once,” she says. “You want to work and be a good mom, be a good partner and see your friends and be a present family member. There just aren’t enough hours in the day sometimes. And then you also must look a certain way doing it all, which is impossible. I think we put impossible standards on all women, for that matter. It’s a problem, and we just need to be a little kinder and conscious about that.”

She admits she wouldn’t be able to keep the schedule she keeps without her team. “I want to make sure people understand that I’m just not like some one-man band that has six arms,” the single mom says. “I have a lot of help.” Being vulnerable is another strong suit. “If you can find comfort in that discomfort, there’s growth there. You can’t have growth without pain. The important thing is to understand why you’re doing something, not just understand the obstacles or what’s hard about it, and then weigh those two out and see if the net result is one worth fighting for.”

“Starting [the Endometriosis Foundation of America] was a turning point in my life”

Lakshmi, who serves as a Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations Development Programme, dedicates a lot of her spare time advocating for the ACLU and raising awareness for endometriosis. “I got my first period when I was 13, and every month was a nightmare,” she says. “In fact, when I was a model, I would dread getting a job the week of my period, especially if it was lingerie, because I suffered so badly from cramps; my flow was so heavy; I would bloat, get swollen, all the things you don’t want to do as a model. It wasn’t until I met a specialist when I was 36 years old that I heard the word endometriosis. It was life-changing because finally somebody understood what I was going through.”

Padma Lakshmi was photographed by Yu Tsai in Dominica. Swimsuit by Toxic Sadie Swimwear.

Yu Tsai/Sports Illustrated

In 2009, she and her doctor formed the Endometriosis Foundation of America after he asked her to speak to some of his patients going through the same thing. “You know, endometriosis proliferates through a woman’s life if left untreated. And it wreaks havoc on every aspect. It’s not just the physical pain; it’s the emotional pain,” she says. “Nobody wants to call their colleagues at work and say, ‘I have my period. I can’t come to work.’ I hated talking about it. Who wants to talk about their period or their vagina? Nobody. It can be a very isolating and lonely disease and chronic pain of any kind is very debilitating. It keeps you from making sound decisions or being stress-free.”

Since its first year, the foundation, now known as EndoFound, has educated 35,000 people. “Starting that foundation was really a turning point in my life and it made me understand that being authentic and being honest and vulnerable pays great dividends, not only to you inside but in the world,” she says. “First speaking about my scar; then speaking about my endometriosis; then speaking up for immigrants and women's rights, all of it has hopefully influenced others positively. It’s also been as beneficial to me in my growth as a human being.”