Rookie SI Swimsuit Model is From Doylestown

Samantha Hoopes, a first-time Sports Illustrated swimsuit model, is from Doylestown. Of course, it sounds now like she’s happy to leave her hometown behind:

People close to me say modeling’s not forever and I agree with them, but I also think the time is now or never so I’d rather have now to look back on rather than never have done it. I’ve always lived in my house under my parents roof. Then when I moved to Hollywood last year, I felt so liberated and like a different person. I could wake up and choose what I wanted to do. For once in my life I’m following my heart instead of doing what people tell me to do.

She’s also one of the models sporting a “painted-on” swimsuit—that is, really, no swimsuit but a swimsuit of illusion.

She’s not the only local connection to the swimsuit issue. Zero G Corporation, which provided the aerial acrobatics necessary for the now-infamous “Kate Upton defies gravity” photo shoot, will be doing a weightless flight out of Philly on May 10.