Tori Praver Wore Just Bodypainted Lingerie During Her SI Swim Photoshoot in Turks and Caicos
SI Swimsuit model Tori Praver posed for the magazine three years in a row. She double dipped during her rookie year with a gorgeous vintage photoshoot with Walter Chin in Memphis, Tenn., and another bodypainting feature with artist Joanne Gair.
Praver returned the following year and was photographed in her hometown of Maui by Stewart Shining. The Truth Fairy author also participated in another bodypaint spread in Turks and Caicos that year. Most recently, the 36-year-old traveled to the Canary Islands in Spain with Steve Erle.
Praver is a repeat Cosmopolitan cover star and at the age of 17, she became the face of GUESS. Today, the mom of three is also the designer and founder of the Tori Praver Swimwear line, which she launched in 2009.
“I grew up in Hawai’i and bikinis were like my shoe fetish. So I loved them and I collected them and I always needed a new one and it just was my little passion. I just decided that I wanted to start my own brand someday,” she said about how she was inspired to create the brand. “Then I started doing Sports Illustrated and one of the editors from the magazine really encouraged me to start sooner rather than later. And it was in the issue later that year, which was cool. So I was sketching and using a lot of vintage suits for inspiration, but I didn’t actually have like proper schooling. It wasn’t so much a challenge, but more challenging myself to be innovative. I wanted to make my brand stand out and be different from everyone else’s. That’s something that’s hard in the swim world because there are only so many styles and silhouettes you can make a bikini look like.”
Below are four of our favorite photos from Praver’s 2008 bodypaint feature with photographer Antoine Verglas.
Now through Nov. 1, 100% of SI Swimsuit’s portion of proceeds from cover prints purchased here will be donated to the Maui Strong Fund, which is helping to support the people and places of Maui affected by the recent wildfires.