American TV personality Tyra Banks just made the ultimate comeback to modelling at the age of 45.
“Sports Illustrated Swimsuit” revealed that Banks was their cover girl Wednesday morning (08.05.19) with the media mogul wearing a tiny yellow string bikini.
It’s only fitting that Banks land the cover once again as she was the first black woman to ever be on the cover of the magazine solo in 1997, reported CNN.
This is Banks’ third time on the cover and even Banks can’t believe where the time has gone, telling ABC’s “GMA,” “My first [cover] was 23 years ago, how crazy is that?!”
“Since Tyra’s first cover in 1996, she’s transformed herself into nothing less than a mogul, a cultural force and a supernova of inspiration and empowerment,” “Sports Illustrated Swimsuit,” Editor MJ Day said in a statement. “She’s kind of the Swimsuit Issue ethos come to life, everything we know this franchise can be.”
Banks who had retired from modelling for several years started her career modelling as a teen and landed covers of nearly every fashion magazine. In 1993 she signed a contract with CoverGirl and went on to become a Victoria’s, Secret Angel.
She dabbled in acting, starring on ‘The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air’ and eventually started her own production company, which went on to produce her long-running hit series, ‘America’s Next Top Model.’
In 2005 she debuted her own talk show, ‘The Tyra Banks Show’, which aired on The CW for five seasons till 2010 and won two Daytime Emmy awards for Outstanding Talk Show Informative. In 2010, she also published a young adult novel titled Modelland, based on her life as a model which topped The New York Times Best Seller list in 2011. Banks is one of four African Americans and seven women to have repeatedly ranked among the world’s most influential people by Time magazine.
Banks welcomed her first child in 2016, a baby boy via surrogacy and in 2017, Banks replaced Nick Cannon as host of ‘America’s Got Talent’ for its 12th season.