Playboy to Feature First Ever Transgender Cover Model

Ines Rau will grace the cover of Playboy’s first issue since Hugh Hefner’s death

transgender playboy

Model Ines Rau will make history next month as the first transgender woman to be featured on the cover of Playboy, in what will be the first issue to hit newsstands since the death of the magazine’s founder, Hugh Hefner.

The 26-year-old Rau has modeled for Playboy before, appearing in the magazine three years ago for a special issue that focused on non-binary genders. The transgender actress Caroline Cossey also posed for Playboy in 1981 shortly before appearing in the film “For Your Eyes Only.” A year later, Cossey came out as transgender, and later posed for Playboy again in 1991.

But Rau’s cover shoot marks her debut as the magazine’s first transgender playmate. She will also pose nude in the magazine’s famous centerfold.

“Nudity shouldn’t be taboo. Nudity means a lot to me, since I went through a transition to get where I want to be,” Rau said in a post on Instagram. “Nudity is a celebration of the human being without all the excess. It’s not about sexuality but the beauty of the human body, whether male or female.”

Not everyone was excited by the news of Rau on the cover. “When I open a Playboy, I expect to see women, not some guy who identifies as a woman, or some former male who has had the surgery to become female,” one person said in a Facebook comment on the page. The Instagram post announcing Rau’s cover shoot was also met with comments attacking Playboy for putting a transgender woman in the centerfold.

Rau said in an interview in the magazine that she’s no longer afraid of her identity.

“It’s a salvation to speak the truth about yourself, whether it’s your gender, sexuality, whatever. The people who reject you aren’t worth it. It’s not about being loved by others; it’s about loving yourself.”

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