Taylor Hale, the reality television star who made history as the first Black woman to win “Big Brother,” has been featured as Playboy’s Miss March 2026, posing in a topless photo shoot that she describes as an act of reclamation over her body and image.
The 31-year-old former Miss Michigan USA 2021 appears in sultry portraits for the magazine’s spring issue, set to hit newsstands in April. In images released Wednesday, Hale is photographed by Kanya Iwana, a female photographer she selected for the project. The shots include her leaning forward behind a red velvet chair with hands covering her chest, balancing in a lacy thong, and displaying confidence in black pointed-toe pumps, among others. Additional photos showcase her glowing complexion, seamless glam makeup and the iconic Playboy bunny logo on sheer lingerie.
Hale, who won Season 24 of the CBS reality competition in 2022, penned a personal essay accompanying the feature. She reflected on the surveillance she experienced inside the “Big Brother” house and the subsequent nonconsensual circulation of images from live feeds online.
“Inside the Big Brother house, I understood that I was being watched. It was explicit and contractual,” Hale wrote. “But even there, the psychological boundaries of consent were more fraught than they appeared.”
She continued: “There are corners of the internet where fragments of my naked body exist. They were clipped from live feeds by viewers who were not interested in the story I was living, but in the access this surveillance provided them. … If your image exists publicly, it’s treated as public property.”
Hale framed her decision to pose for Playboy as a deliberate counter to that exploitation. “Choosing to be photographed in this way, now, is a direct engagement with this new reality. It’s a reminder that my body is not public property simply because it was made public before,” she stated.
The Detroit native emphasized her active role in the shoot, describing herself as a “collaborator” who had full agency in the process. Limited photos are currently available online, with the full spread in the upcoming issue, which fans can pre-order.
Hale’s Playboy debut has drawn attention across entertainment outlets, with coverage highlighting the empowering narrative she presented amid her past experiences on reality TV.
Flip the pages for the Playboy photos.
