Data-Driven: Plan B

Posted on by Team Penthouse

Delving Into the Data-Driven

We have two questions for you before we get to the Data-Driven part of our revelation today.

  1. Do you remember when we said that last Thursday (April 7th) was going to be the last day for the public to vote on the Penthouse 2022 Pet of the Year?
  2. Do you remember some years back — ok, so a lot of years back — when a character (or a friend) might jump up and yell, “PSYCHE!”?

If you answered in the affirmative to question two, then you probably know where we’re heading today. Should you not remember this expression, perhaps a visual representation could be of some assistance.

So that pretty much explains what “PSYCHE!” meant back in the day, and here we are again finding it useful. Heck, maybe we’ll start the trend all over again. Eddie Murphy used it in a routine about buying ice cream, and as much as we all love ice cream, us using it in the context of our Data-Driven exploration of modern Penthouse Pets seems more interesting than that.

We find ourselves somewhat limited in what we can publicly reveal, but basically after over three full months of voting, the final tally for the 2022 Pet of the Year popular vote ended up amazingly close. They will not allow us to give specific numbers, but we can say that the number of people that have voted for the POY has passed well into six figures, and yet something extraordinary — at least in our experience with this particular annual vote — has happened. Literally 20 votes applied one way or the other would completely rearrange the order of the top four women in the contest. This thing came out really close. Twenty votes after that much time and this many votes hit us as truly bizarre. Usually by about half way through the contest you can pick the top three places at the end with a big degree of confidence, based on how the vote has been going thus far. By maybe 70% of the vote being in, you will essentially know who the winner will be for sure.

So at the very highest level of Executive Strategizing, a new mandate descended. We do not really have an executive dining room, because we honestly don’t have that many executives, and besides Los Angeles has nothing if not an abundance of superior eating establishments close to any given location. Given that, we feel confident in our little web world that this decision certainly came after the consumption of large portions of seared beef along with several have-to-be-bad-for-you side dishes. Whatever the case, we now have a new plan.

Voting for the 2022 Penthouse Pet of the Year has been extended.

Despite what you may have heard, or learned from any number of social media outlets or direct email campaigns, the Execs have decided you need more time. While you ponder this amended reality in our new Data-Driven world, we thought a few photographs of the Pet of the Year winners from 2006-2010 might be fun. So we dug some up.

That was better than a great many things in life, right? We hope it serves as a bit of an apology if you have been making special concessions in your life to be sure you voted every week for your favorite Pet. On the upside, now you get to vote some more, so … YAY?

You see, everybody has their personal favorites, and nobody wants to “lose” by some piddly number like 20 votes. So far no highly-important people have called us up on the telephone saying anything scandalous like, “I just need to find this many votes” or anything, just to be clear. If that does happen, though, we will not need a committee to look into anything. This actually IS a dictatorship, so we will do as we are told. If the Emperor wants to be naked, fine. We’re quite used to naked people around here.

Truth be told, a lot of factors go in to choosing the ultimate Pet of the Year winner. The public vote, although very important, does not necessarily rule the roost entirely. We can’t really divulge the other factors — ok, mostly because we do not know them — but at some point the decision gets made (perhaps at one of those aforementioned fine eateries) and some months later we all hear about it. You might be surprised to learn that in our little web world, we have in the past learned the winner of the Pet of the Year contest by looking at a printed magazine just like everybody else. … Shocking, right?! … You should complain to the Penthouse Executives for us, because, y’know … dictatorship.

At any rate, they say “two more weeks” which would put us still compiling votes until Earth Day, oddly enough. Of course we have no plans to bank on that by locking it in or anything. Once bitten. Twice shy. All that. (The concept, not the Great White song.) While that sinks in, we figured it couldn’t hurt to throw in another Data-Driven PSYCHE! Moment with Gianna Dior.

You should consider that maybe a nice PenthouseGold membership for a month or so might appease some of this PSYCHE frustration, to be clear. For our part we need to look up people who keep track of things like this, because we have discovered the actual four worst words ever uttered in an office environment: We have Plan B.

As you may have noticed by now, we will not often link you out to “The Guardian” because it tends to be, well, itself, but we did find a fun list of other Horrible Office Phrases you might enjoy — pretty much all the result of this Data-Driven quest of the modern corporation — so take a look if you wish. … OH! And we almost forgot: VOTE.

VR: Virtually Ready

Posted on by Team Penthouse

Making Virtual Reality Worthwhile

VR has its place in many niches, including first-person shooter games, flight and work training simulators and immersive experiences that can only be conveyed through the medium of three dimensions. One thing many of its users have in common is their consumption of pornography, which has become the de facto sales driver of the technology. But a lack of worthwhile applications and a limited library of games — offering more gimmicks than full-fledged experiences — hampers the medium.

In contrast to the number of users who utilize their headsets to play video games on a regular basis, VR porn dwarfs every other use-case by a long mile. And that’s a problem. Not because it’s being used for porn — but because it’s not being used for much else. VR is not achieving its full potential, and the market simply isn’t sold on the medium — at least not yet.

Virtual reality is an isolating experience. When you put on a headset, it disconnects you from the real world. Maybe that’s a good thing for those who want that experience. But for those who feel discomfort in the disconnection, it’s a chore. When real life calls, disconnecting from your immersion and reconnecting becomes a wholly irritating ritual.

By itself, getting VR to work is a hassle and a half; it doesn’t work out of the box. You have to install drivers, make physical space and have the necessary hardware to even run the damn thing. It’s an expensive hobby with little payoff.

Worse still, most VR headsets are not even wireless; those that are offer decreased graphical fidelity and are about as immersive as watching James Cameron’s Avatar in 3D. In other words, they suck. The controllers themselves are unintuitive and require you to fumble around to perform the simplest tasks in most games, such as Skyrim VR and Doom VFR, where even moving around requires you to teleport from place to place. While it’s nice that some major developers offer VR experiences, these offerings are few and far between. The VR market isn’t big enough for most publishers to even invest in creating standalone VR titles. It’s a poor investment for both publishers and consumers, and that feeds into the circuitous problem of there not being enough users to make the development worthwhile — and not enough games for most users to justify buying a headset.

The reduction in bulk and wireless freedom are a given. Miniaturization and wirelessness will come with the march of progress, but there are a number of things VR manufacturers can do to make their products worthwhile.

VR’s problems need to be addressed at the roots. Its greatest strength, isolation, is also its greatest weakness. Coupled with the disorientation you experience when you come back to reality, there’s simply no easy way to “tab out.” The VR industry could learn a thing or two from Apple: Add a transparency mode.

You shouldn’t need to take off your headset to see and hear the world around you or respond to your email. It has to be convenient to be attractive to the wider market. After all, noise-isolating headphones wouldn’t be quite as convenient if you had to take them off to talk to someone. And being able to see your surroundings would eliminate the hassle of removing and putting back on your headset, completely killing the immersion. Having cameras and microphones mounted on the headset is an easy fix — to say nothing of how bulky these things are at the moment.

The elephant in the room is the fact that there’s no standard for VR headsets. While some applications work on multiple devices, most simply do not. You’re either getting an Oculus, an HTC Vive or a Samsung. You might go for a Valve Index, if you’re feeling extravagant. Platform exclusivity is a factor that limits what you can experience with your investment.

Unlike TVs and monitors, the experience is less than uniform, for both developers and users alike — and given that the whole point of VR is to be immersive, anything less than a solid experience is not only immersion-breaking, it’s headache-inducing. It doesn’t help that VR headsets have intense hardware requirements; the cost of VR doesn’t end with the headset alone. 

The good news is that the industry understands these problems and is actively working to solve them. It only remains to be seen if the consumer market will have the patience to tolerate VR as a work in progress before it finally reaches maturity.

Lest this all make you think that VR exists only for people that love video games, we wanted to point out that the technology has transitioned into regular movies as well. Should that interest you, the veer blog might be worth checking out if you have some free time. This, of course, leaves aside any comment as to the kind of individual that desires to immerse themselves — even virtually — into your typical Hollywood horror movie. We will say that to some of us, having an “immersive experience” in, say, a tour of a Ben & Jerry’s factory sounds like a lot more fun. … This last image comes from the VR version of the wildly popular DOOM franchise. Sure, being in the middle of this would be way better than virtually enjoying a deserted beach on Fiji. What were we thinking?

Virtual Reality Doom

Quannah Chasinghorse

Posted on by Team Penthouse

True Grit

Stunning and strong, Indigenous model and activist Quannah Chasinghorse is redefining American beauty. Dubbed one of fashion’s freshest new faces, Quannah embraces her unique ancestry, which includes the Raven Clan of the Hän Gwich’in from Alaska and Native American Oglala Lakota from South Dakota.

The 19-year-old trailblazer, who was born in Navajo Nation territory in Arizona and has lived in Alaska for more than a decade, wowed A-listers and fans alike at last fall’s Met Gala. She walked the red carpet clad in a glimmering gold gown by Peter Dundas for Revolve and Navajo turquoise jewelry from her “aunty” Jocelyn Billy-Upshaw, who was crowned Miss Navajo Nation in 2006. Considered the badass breakout star of the evening, Quannah was praised on social media for her exquisite embodiment of the event’s theme: “In America: A Lexicon of Fashion.”

Quannah Chasinghorse at 2021 Met Gala, NYC
(Photo by Taylor Hill/WireImage)

Her glowing looks were also accentuated by her attention-grabbing ink — the lines extending down her chin and trailing from the corners of her expressive eyes are traditional Hän Gwich’in hand-poked tattoos called Yidįįłtoo.

She says of her tattoos, “They make me feel more confident because I’m carrying a part of my ancestors that was almost completely lost” due to colonization.

Quannah explains the middle line on her chin was “all about becoming a woman.”

She adds in her culture, “When someone steps into her womanhood, she is now able to give birth, get married and start taking on more responsibilities. With that comes a ceremony; we always hold a ceremony when we do traditional tattoos. It was such a powerful experience. When I got the tattoo, I really felt myself connecting to a deeper part of myself.”

Quannah says her tattoos are “a great reminder of who I am, the powerful meaning, how far I’ve come, where I come from and how resilient and strong my people, my bloodline and my ancestors are.”

Before she attended the high-profile New York City bash — and graced the cover of Vogue Mexico with her nose ring and Alaska Native earrings — Fairbanks-based Quannah used her voice to advocate for conservation of her state’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, which has been threatened by fossil fuel extraction.

With nearly 250,000 followers on her Instagram account @quannah.rose, her social media platform reflects her concern for the environment and her devotion to causes she holds dear, and Quannah says, “I grew up seeing my mom work so hard for her people — she taught me that there’s no shame in speaking up.”

Quannah says her mother also taught her and her brothers “how to hunt, fish, chop wood, and took us berry picking,” and the family “had our own snare line and trapline. We even had a dog team, and when it would get too cold to where the vehicle wouldn’t start, my mom would drop us off by dog team.”

But a hunger for activism has remained ever present in her life and was even the springboard for her modeling debut in a 2020 Calvin Klein campaign that emphasized the importance of voting — a gig that led to her being signed by powerhouse agency IMG Models.

However, her very presence in the world of high fashion is its own form of activism, a fact that doesn’t escape intuitive Quannah. She admits in her youth, “I was obsessed with watching runway shows on television — Dior, Chanel, Prada — and I was always posing for pictures.” But she says a lack of representation made it “really hard” for her to feel like she had the potential to be a model.

“I never grew up feeling confident because of the negative stereotypes of Native Americans,” says Quannah. “But that’s changing. Today, younger generations are going to be able to witness Indigenous excellence on the cover of magazines — and hopefully everywhere.”

Firmly grounded in her beliefs, unafraid to speak her mind and exuding a confidence that only enhances her natural beauty makes Quannah our quintessential woman of the moment.

Should you wish to put your money where her mouth is, we are certain that anything you can do for the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge would make her very happy. She’s not going to be dropping by for dinner just because you helped, but we all do our part – or at least that would be a worthy goal.

POY 2022 — No Foolin’

Posted on by Team Penthouse

POY 2022 Contest Winds Down

What has been a remarkably long public voting round for Pet of the Year 2022 will finally close one week from today. To avoid math problems fraught with potential headaches if you do not happen to be reading this the day it goes live, we can help you out: Voting for the POY 2022 ends at midnight (L.A. time) on April 7th. Given that the new CEO decided upon this quarter of a year approach, we started talking about how much things have changed for the POY contest over the years.

Naturally this got us to looking about for POY winner schwag, because, hey, once the contest is over and people have forgotten all about who won, we really only care about the goodies, right? Well, “publishing” was a different “thing” back before the Internet, and thus companies who had millions of people waiting to get a printed magazine in the mailbox every month tended to have additional millions of dollars to play with. They game some really cool presents, as it turned out, the value of which may or may have had anything to do with whether or not the winner happened to be living at Bob’s house at the time.

Those darned coincidences, y’know?

At any rate, we ran through a pretty decadent list of things that most people would not even want anymore, but it was last century, and things were weird. While you might be able to something with a car, or possibly even a catamaran, most people have no idea where they could even wear a fur coat anymore — even if they wanted to wear it — which they probably do not. Way back in 1976 the magazine listed “Cash and Gifts worth over $50,000” but then sort of stole its own thunder by listing the gifts as …

  1. Porche 924
  2. Lynx coat
  3. 18’ Catamaran
  4. Swimwear

Suffice it to say that the fancy Porche cost less than $10K when it debuted that year and even fully loaded in the turbo version they came in at under $20,000 — a long, long way from 50 for the high-ticket item, well, unless that was some seriously fancy swimwear. They stuck to the bragging about dollar value concept for some time, though. By 1981 it was “Cash and Gifts worth over $200,000” (allegedly), culminating in 1983, which promised a “First Annual $1,000,000 Pet of the Year Pageant.” … More on this last one later.

POY 1996 Aquarium ClockWe then started crawling through other years, where we found the dazzling POY 1996 offering pictured to the side here, along with the typical car, coat, fancy clothes combinations that had become common. They had given up listing dollar value in the splash reveals, but had seriously branched into sponsored gifts. In a list of 25+ items, buried among the “attire” we discovered Andi Sue Irwin also scored …

  1. Three Nights in Athens, Greece followed by a 7-day islands cruise
  2. An 8-day Resort vacation in Nassau, Bahamas
  3. A week with up to 8 guests in a Mountain Chalet Resort

For the record, it turns out Andi invited none of us still here at Penthouse to accompany her on that trip, and we’re barely even bitter about it. If we ever see her again, we’re definitely going to ask what she did with the aquarium clock, though. Seriously, how do you clean a 6′ deep aquarium you cannot dive into? Those little scrubby magnet things were terrible, although people still buy them apparently. Hey, at least she got a helmet to go with her new motorcycle, and she did get $1,500 worth of free food at two different New York City restaurants, so she could have taken like three friends to lunch with her using those.

Bottom line, our POY 2022 Contest Comparison rabbit hole got less exciting pretty quickly, so instead we had the Art Dept grab a few photos of a random selection of past Pet of the Year winners, requesting specifically images featuring the model and the gifts. We got 18 fascinating photos of …

  1. POY 1976, Laura Doone
  2. POY 1981, Danielle Deneux
  3. POY 1983, Sheila Kennedy
  4. POY 1996, Andi Sue Irwin
  5. POY 2007, Heather Vandeven

Granted, only a couple of these actually picture the women with gifts they won in their POY contest, but a couple of them do, and that’s not bad from the Art Dept, honestly. (They can lose interest when you tell them you want photographs with clothes on the Pets. Go figure.) Actually, the research did turn up something interesting about that 1983 Sheila Kennedy year, but that as it happens would be a story already told. Sheila did happen to be one of those coincidetal “living with Bob” people, so…

For now, enjoy the gallery. If you reload the page, all the pictures will reorganize themselves, so it’s almost like you get to see new things again. We’ve done it dozens of times around here — just to be sure it works, of course.

By the way, the POY 2022 winner will not get a car, or a fur coat, a motorcycle, or (as far as we know) and aquarium clock. She does get a custom diamond-encrusted Pet Key necklace, and although we are not allowed to list the price, we can tell you it costs well North of a Porche 924 back in 1976. We also were going to ask a really famous (well, now slash-infamous) person quite familiar with beauty contests if he knew what happened to Bob’s grand plans back in 1984. We decided not to reach out, though, as this person has quite a few other things on his plate currently. He’s spent the last two years trying to learn how to count.

OH! At this point you probably have this page memorized, but just in case you’d like to get one more POY 2022 vote into the calculation. That page will be HERE until the end of April 7th. After that, the page becomes really boring. Fair warning…

Ahegao

Posted on by Team Penthouse

What the F#$% is Ahegao?

I have been introduced to a lot of bizarre fetishes throughout my time writing about sex, but the phenomenon of ahegao continues to bemuse and confuse me.

Ahegao, pronounced ah-heh-gah-oh, refers to a facial expression typically characterized by crossed eyes, a dangly tongue, blushing cheeks and a moist trifecta of snot, drool and tears spraying from the face of a person — usually a woman. Essentially, the ahegao face is more comical and disturbing than sexy, and leaves its wearer looking like they licked a toad while trying to get high, but ended up in a hectic K-hole instead.

The term ahegao originated in Japan in the ’60s and only started to gain popularity on the internet in the last decade. The word itself stems from the Japanese word “aheahe,” which refers to someone who is moaning or panting from physical exertion or sexual arousal. The exaggerated facial expression is meant to depict someone who has lost control and is experiencing an orgasm so intense it’s caused them to lose their basic faculties. They have essentially been fucked silly.

While it’s not very realistic, it’s also not a particularly flattering look for the hot chick wearing it. Yet, a rise in the obsession with the expression has seen ahegao go viral, with the funny face even making its way into mainstream culture. Beyond its heavy contribution to ahegao-themed photos and porn, a quick internet search will return a wealth of ahegao memes, ahegao clothing and even ahegao celebrities, like internet cosplayer and nerd dream girl Belle Delphine, who’s managed to build a wildly successful career off the back of her own crossed-eyed, tongue-wagging pictures. On top of that, Reddit’s ahegao-related subreddits have reached more than a quarter million followers, thanks to manga nerds and regular Joes who fantasize about banging a Lolita-esque woman with such wizardry that she can’t even keep her tongue in her own gob.

While some might say ahegao is sexist because it glorifies a lack of female control, others say it’s empowering because it puts women’s pleasure front and center, with them striving to achieve frenzy-inducing ahegao orgasms. Other models who create ahegao content say the niche allows them to explore their sexuality without necessarily being nude or explicit.

Each to their own, but I’ll stick with the K-hole, thanks.

Yeah, so we looked up K-Hole, because clearly at least this author is really, really old, and honestly the experience does not sound all that wonderful at first glance. If you want to experience hallucinogenic effects, just turn on Fox News or MSNBC and try to reconcile what you are hearing with what you know to be true out in the real world. That’ll scramble your brain without risking death. Research being important around here, of course we did more on the main topic at hand. We swear we did not laugh at any of the Ahegao Memes we found either. And you cannot prove any differently.

After that mess, we decided to throw in another quick distraction from Penthouse Vault. You don’t need to feel pressured to join or anything; we simply wanted a sort of sorbet for the mind moment going here. Notice that you see not a single bit of drooling here? … Yeah, that was on purpose. Oh, and for the record, despite what these pictures may look like, none of these women starred in “Flashdance” in the movies or “Hart of Dixie” on television.

Veteran Care

Posted on by Team Penthouse

Law and Disorder at the Veterans Administration (or Affairs)

America’s obligation to veterans was solidified in the country’s imagination by President Abraham Lincoln, who in the final days of the Civil War called upon Congress to “care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan.” Two major policies stemmed from Lincoln’s request: standardized pension payments and the establishment of a national network of homes for veterans with disabilities.

The first of these facilities was erected in 1867. Along with providing care to those who’d served, these homes also featured an internal judicial system, one largely intended to keep suffering veterans out of civilian prisons. Much like the outside world, these homes had police officers upholding the rules and jail cells for offenders. This was perhaps the earliest example of hospital policing in America, a trend that has rapidly accelerated in recent years, both in private hospitals and also at facilities run by the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA).

Today, the VA operates a well-armed law enforcement agency of more than 4,000 officers. There are, of course, legitimate reasons to ensure safety inside VA clinics, which often treat military-trained patients with severe psychological issues. The department’s purported values are summed up in its simple motto: “Protecting Those Who Served.”

Yet this maxim doesn’t always match the reality on the ground. For decades, veteran patients have been improperly surveilled, assaulted and criminally charged. VA police themselves are poorly trained and face little oversight. When I investigated them for The Intercept two years ago, I found dozens of troubling stories, including cops disregarding basic police procedures and violating veterans’ constitutional rights.

In the wake of that report, lawmakers and VA officials promised reforms. And yet little has been done. Days after the VA pledged to create new oversight structures, the department’s then-top cop sent an e-mail to officers assuring them that new rules would have “very little to no impact on you, your officers and your operations.” He further promised that oversight would largely remain scant and at the hospital level. “You and your teams do an outstanding job, day in and day out,” he concluded.

In the face of sclerosis, a slew of new horror stories has emerged. At one facility, in Butler, Penn., cops ran training drills with loaded weapons, a stunt that endangered veterans and broke federal rules. In Bay Pines, Fla., an officer used excessive force on a veteran, then authored false arrest affidavits to justify his violence. In Roseburg, Ore., another was credibly accused of placing hidden cameras in the bedroom of a 14-year-old girl.

A number of veteran patients have also been killed by VA cops under dubious circumstances. The most recent incident came in January 2020, when an Army veteran holding a knife was shot 19 times and killed after seeking psychiatric care at a VA facility in Dallas, Texas. A police report said the vet was leaving the hospital when officers chased him down, attempted to disarm him and fired their weapons.

Similarly shocking behavior can be found inside many American police departments. But the VA cops stand out for their reportedly poor hiring practices, incompetent oversight and almost peerless impunity. These conditions collided in the case of José Oliva, a Vietnam veteran and former cop, who in February 2016 was beaten and arrested after seeking dental care at the VA in El Paso, Texas.

During Oliva’s security screening that day, a VA cop allegedly demanded to see his license. Oliva’s lawyers said their client explained to the officer that his ID was in an inspection bin along with his other personal items. This answer seemingly set off the cop, who approached Oliva, then 70, with handcuffs drawn. In a flash, numerous cops tackled Oliva to the floor and beat him. His subsequent charge of disorderly conduct was later dropped.

Oliva enlisted in the U.S. Air Force in April 1965 — one month before his high school graduation. He touched down in Saigon, Vietnam, just before the Tet Offensive, a campaign of savvy surprise attacks against American and allied forces that kicked off the bloodiest year of the war.

During this period, Oliva’s hot and humid jungle base was frequently attacked. Over the course of his deployment, several airmen on base lost their lives. “I remember thinking, ‘If I survive this mess, I need to follow orders, I need to stay safe,’” Oliva told me. “I didn’t want to take any more gambles in life.”

And so he didn’t. After returning safely to America, Oliva kept on the straight and narrow. “I came back to the United States and got a good life for myself,” he explained. “I earned my degree, married my wife, had two little girls.” Oliva also came to appreciate the physical and mental health care he received at the VA.

His beating upended everything. Not only did it result in serious shoulder injuries that required surgery, as well as persistent ear and throat issues, but it also caused deep psychological scars. Oliva became skittish to seek care. For a while, he wore sunglasses and a Vietnam veteran baseball cap to appointments in an attempt to blend in. “After the attack, I was much more careful,” he said. “I tried to avoid encounters with the cops and others on the hospital premises. But sometimes they’d recognize me and stare at me.”

Oliva first sought justice — unsuccessfully — through VA channels. Then he went through the courts, alleging his Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable searches and seizures were violated by the VA police. His case faced steeps odds, thanks to broad set of legal protections enjoyed by federal officials known as “qualified immunity.”

Predictably, the officers who’d beat Oliva invoked these rights at trial. A district court judge rejected the officers’ argument, noting that they had “violated clearly established law when they used excessive force on an unresisting suspect” who “did not commit a crime.”

Unhappy with this decision, the cops appealed the case to the Fifth Circuit federal appellate court. There, a judge made no decision on the issue of immunity, but nonetheless dealt a blow to Oliva by ruling that he had no standing to sue the federal government. This ruling hinged on an antiquated 1971 decision that created only specific circumstances under which federal officers can be held responsible for constitutional abuses.

In spring 2020, Oliva appealed his case to the Supreme Court of the United States, contending the Fifth Circuit ruling flew in the face of other key judgements. His appeal also argued the ruling set a dangerous precedent, effectively giving broad immunity to all officers across the Fifth Circuit, a massive swath of land encompassing Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi. This region, it’s worth noting, is crawling with officers from the FBI, ICE, ATF and CBP.

In a devastating blow, the highest court in the land announced in May that they wouldn’t hear Oliva’s case.

“I will never give up,” he said after the news broke. “As we say in the military: duty, honor, country. We leave no one behind, and we don’t give up. I invite every American to join me in this fight. The Constitution is here to protect all of us. It does not take a leave of absence when the perpetrator happens to work for the federal government.”

Jose Oliva

They have changed Veterans Administration to “Veterans Affairs” now, which either means they are making a concerted effort to appear more caring than dictatorial, or they can help you cheat on your spouse. We hope it’s option one there.

Jayden Cole

Posted on by Team Penthouse

Jayden ColePenthouse Pet of the Month December 2009

Height: 5’10”
Measurements: 35C-24-36
Hometown: Long Beach, CA
Fun Fact: Big Extreme Sports Fan

Favorite food: Sushi.

Favorite drink: Sake.

What’s the hottest movie sex scene?
I like anything with Megan Fox.

Your biggest turn-on:
When a guy can make me laugh, I’m all his.

 

So we learned all of that years ago when Jayden did her Pet Questionnaire for the magazine. Some time has passed since that highlight, of course, so we did a little catching up with Ms. Cole, because … well, she’s still fascinating. These questions come from the ManyVids folks, which adds a different flair to them certainly. Honestly, we could not remember the last time we heard someone ask a porn star her favorite color. It sounds like Jayden’s answer should have been “marinara,” but you can judge for yourself.

What is your favorite thing about working in the adult industry?

The personal freedom that I have been able to enjoy in my career is immeasurable. I can basically work anytime, from anywhere. I love bringing my followers along for all my adventures, and the harder you work, the more results you see, no matter what your goals are!

What inspired you to work as a content creator?

I never really thought  of  myself  as a content creator; I feel like I just naturally progressed into it. I don’t think I would have been prepared for getting to have a say in every aspect of my content when I first started shooting. I’m so happy to have gotten the experience early on in the industry shooting for other companies to gain the knowledge and experience necessary to eventually have total control over every aspect of my productions.

Who is your hero?

My hero is myself. Looking back on how I’ve handled life’s  challenges and obstacles, I’m proud of how I went about everything with strength and grace, staying true to  myself, and never let anyone bring me down to their level. I never let anyone or anything keep me from staying kind and finding joy every day.

What is your favorite color?

My favorite color is anything that has a blue/green/teal shade; it reminds me of the ocean and nature.

What type of movies do you enjoy watching?

I’m  honestly  horrible  with  movies. I don’t remember the last one I saw from beginning to end; no movies have really gotten my attention over the past decade, but I love documentaries and nature shows!

If you could change anything in this world, what would it be?

I feel like there are quite a few things that this world needs in order to have a bright future for the next generations to come. I’d probably start by limiting everyone’s access to the internet, myself included, and remind everyone daily that there’s no value in being better than anyone else.

What do you look for in your partners?

I really look for someone humble and true to who they are. No acts, no role- playing, no trying too hard to impress others. Just honest and comfortable in their own skin.

What is your favorite travel destination?

I like to go where there is good scuba diving! Basically, anywhere I can dive every morning, lay on the beach all afternoon and eat well every night.

If you could go anywhere in the world, where would it be?

I’ve already knocked a few of my top destinations off my list, but when I get more experience diving, I will be going to the Galapagos Islands!

If Jayden Cole had a superpower, what would it be?

I wouldn’t mind being invisible sometimes.

What is the most important thing in your life?

Family and taking care of myself!

Penthouse Cover, December 2009

Penthouse Magazine Subscription

Should you wish to keep some Stormi Maya memories of your own, a Penthouse Magazine Subscription might be just the ticket. We have individual issues available digitally, but if you still like the feeling of paper in your hands, we can send you Penthouse or Penthouse Letters every month — right to your door, just like when Bob Gucionne started this adventure.

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What is something you can’t resist?

Tom Ford men’s cologne. It doesn’t matter if it’s on a man or a woman; if I smell it, I’m intrigued.

What’s something nobody knows about you?

I moved to Montana this year and started a new business selling berries and other fruits and vegetables to different local vendors. I plan on expanding every year with different varieties of sustainably sourced products. Montana has a great program (Made in Montana) where they prioritize locally made products in every big commercial store and market to incentivize people to keep farming.

What’s your idea of a perfect date?

I cook a lot at home, so when I go out, I like to get dressed up, have a three-hour dinner at a fancy restaurant, then  go home, put comfy clothes on and have some good dessert, whether that’s food or my date’s company. Simple, but so good!

What is the most random fact about Jayden Cole?

I’m taking cooking classes. My next one is all about ravioli!

What’s the Jayden Cole guilty pleasure?

Currently, I’m on a Woodford Reserve kick.

What is your favorite comfort food?

I lived in coastal Georgia for most of my childhood, so my favorite comfort food is gumbo and biscuits

Are you a morning or night person?

Definitely a morning person! I love being up before the world is awake.

Do you enjoy staying in or going out on the town?

Staying in 90 percent. Going out 10 percent. That’s my perfect balance.

PenthouseGold Banner for Jayden Cole

Once a Pet, always a Pet. Give Jayden some love when you run across her. She deserves it. You can also, of course, check out the more modern (defined as chosen under owners after Friend Finder, maybe not the best carriers of the Penthouse Brand flag) Pets on these very pages.

For the Love of Psychos

Posted on by Team Penthouse

On-Screen Psychos

Psychos are good for the chills — Fatal Attraction, if nothing else, put a whole generation off rabbit stew — but they’re also lots of fun to be around.

It’s hard not to enjoy the babyishly brutal Peter III of Russia as played by Nicholas Hoult in the Hulu series The Great. (The fact Hoult’s most memorable performance before that involved him singing “Killing Me Softly” as a kid without friends in 2002’s About a Boy was a clear warning.) It’s equally hard not to cheer for the Joker as he repeatedly tries to end boring-as-batshit Batman. Likewise Moriarty (possible psycho) as he torments goody-two-shoes coke fiend Sherlock Holmes, and Wile E. Coyote (definite psycho) as he tries to flatten Road Runner.

Tim Roth’s character in the new film Sundown was described in The Guardian as a “wonderfully relaxed sociopath,” and the movie itself was dubbed the “funniest” and “nastiest” at this year’s Venice Film Festival — a classic blend of right-on and revolting.

Villanelle (Jodie Comer) in Killing Eve is a “living, breathing, shopping, killing psychopath” — not to mention babe — whose attractiveness to Eva Polastri (Sandra Oh) is perfectly believable. Dexter Morgan (Michael C. Hall) in Dexter is a square-jawed, cop-come-psycho who kills for, um, good. Patrick Bateman (Christian Bale) in American Psycho makes us laugh while cleaving heads. Annie Wilkes (Kathy Bates) in Misery is a lovable homebody who hobbles a writer with a mallet and Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins) in Psycho wears his mom’s clothes — lol.

The stylized brutality of the screen sociopath is a salve for society’s chafing manacles. Unlike us, they’re given free rein to do whatever they want, which usually involves sticking it to the man, literally.

If you’re conflicted about having feels for screen psychos, take heart from the fact that you’re not a psycho. Real psychos lack empathy and wouldn’t feel conflicted (or any other emotion) about cheering for the bad guys in A Clockwork Orange. They probably don’t even Netflix and chill because they reportedly have no creativity or inner life.

Hannibal Lecter (Anthony Hopkins) in Silence of the Lambs, with his love of art and literature, not to mention his appetite — in a good way — for Jodie Foster’s Clarice? Killer, please! A 2014 Belgian study by forensic psychiatrists looked at 126 fictional psychopaths and concluded Anton Chigurh (Javier Bardem) of the Cohen Brothers’ No Country for Old Men was the most clinically accurate portrayal. Which is to say: If a dude with a terrifying haircut and air-powered bolt gun asks you for a quick game of heads or tails, keep walking. The same study found that — as in real life — there were far fewer female screen psychos than male. The majority of those that exist — just think Catherine Tramell (Sharon Stone) in Basic Instinct — tend to be sexy killer nymphs, which again is sadly unrealistic, unless you’re a spider.

I mean, I say “sadly” but I don’t really mean it. What do you think I am — a psycho? 

Clearly the preceding article as it appeared in Penthouse Magazine puts forth a lot of purely editorial opinion, and around here we vigorously defend the right to hold – and voice – one’s own opinion. That said, if you ever find yourself rooting for the villains in “A Clockwork Orange,” at the very least you need a nap.

 

On to a completely unrelated more pleasingly visual topic, this seemed like a grand time to do one of those thinly disguised plugs for paid memberships. … OK. So that’s not entirely true, this actually has no disguise at all. It would be more of a blatant plug, although that does not make it less valuable, should your interests lie in the Penthouse Vault arena.

In manner of explanation, we jumped into that section of the membership site and sort of randomly picked an assortment of images to display in this gallery – and we say “randomly” because we do have the “people need to be clothed” rule in the free areas of sites the Penthouse main office controls.

If you happen to be unaware, the “Vault” section of PenthouseGold remasters original chromes (usually chromes) from any point in the magazine history where photographers were using this old-school recording method call film. (You may need to look that up on Wikipedia if you find yourself unfamiliar with the term.) We can assure you that Psychos was not a theme in any of these shoots, but as you can see, we do have a history of interesting photographic excursions.

You might also be interested to know that every one of these pictures in this Flirty Dozen comes from a gallery set on PenthouseGold published since the first of this year. (That would be roughly over the last couple of months, should you be reading this article later and not want to do the math.) … Currently the site boasts well over a thousand individual layouts remastered and republished in digital format, so should you be a fan of Penthouse history, you might enjoy that section, even despite the standard video emphasis that all modern adult sites employ. You can get videos in thousands of places on the web – including free places, obviously – but you can only find Penthouse layouts on PenthouseGold.

Exclusive rocks, right? We have always been just a tad bit different in this company, and have always taken pride in that fact, truthfully.

For the record, naturally, Penthouse has never, ever shot a single model from the Psychos category; we want to be clear about this. … That’s our story, and we’re sticking to it.

St. Patrick’s Day 2022

Posted on by Team Penthouse

An Eternal Moment for St. Patrick’s Day 2022

The editing department always does these “promotions” for the various holidays, and to the extent we can out here in PG-Land, we like to show them off too. Granted one minute of beautiful women you cannot touch — almost certainly even if you met them in person — may not be the most fun you’ll have all day, but it’s a lot cheaper than a strip club. And you don’t even have to leave home.

The keen eyes out there will recognize our St. Patrick’s Pets as Gianna Dior, Anny Aurora, Kenzie Anne, Tahlia Paris, Meaghan Stanfill , Stormi Maya, MSPUIYI, Violet Summers, Hanna Carter, and Lacey London. Now we got that list from the editors, and we went to try and put all those names in order of appearance, but we kept getting distracted. Hey, maybe 1-minute videos do have their place in the world. At least we didn’t go to all this work only to have the video disappear in 24 hours, after we get beyond St. Patrick’s Day 2022. (Social Media people can be baffling to those of us who try to insert some sense of value into their work. Of course, most of us also actually read for fun, so clearly we’re beyond hope.)

By the way, we do feel obligated to mention that you can see all of these stellar Pets in rather more revealing exposure on PenthouseGold, should you wish to join that membership site. And by that we mean we are obligated to mention that. Sometimes the PenthouseGold people think we’re having too much fun and not enough business. Oh, bother.

In that now reverent mood, we continue. … And now for something completely different…

A Moment in Time

Jova is a San Francisco-based photographer and videographer, whose cinematic photographs of nude women painted in natural light evoke film stills — and may leave viewers feeling like voyeurs witnessing intimate moments. Penthouse spoke with Jova about how he went from being a fashion photographer to shooting nudes, his favorite photo shoot and how his work straddles the fine line between beauty and vulgarity.

How would you describe your work?

Simple, pretty, effortless. I have embraced those three words for a while, as a way to describe the majority of my shoots. I love to capture moments where the model is expressing an emotion or a feeling, but also allow them to feel natural and tell a story. These words also extend to the wardrobe, props and even hair and makeup. The more organic everything looks and feels the better.

How did you get into photography?

My shoots early on were fashion shoots. I would photograph a lot of fashion shows and do photo shoots for designers for their websites. During one fashion show, I met a person who owned a nude magazine. I then booked my first nude photo shoot with a very experienced model. I was very nervous and had the worst possible gear, but showed up anyway. Daria was an angel. She patiently guided me that day. My confidence in doing nude photo shoots went from zero to 100.

What draws you to shooting nudes and erotic imagery?

I have always loved doing shoots where the model is in the most natural state. I love to create beautiful shapes and moods, where the model can express herself and feel confident and powerful. It is very rewarding to see a woman feel absolutely beautiful and empowered, while showcasing her sensuality in the nude.

What makes a photo sensual to you?

A combination of mood, pose and setting. Telling a story is not as easy as it sounds. It takes effort from both the model and the photographer to create the right mood and capture it in a way that is elevated and classy. There is a fine line between beautiful art and vulgar work.

Tell us about your favorite photo shoot.

My most recent trip to Joshua Tree with Deisy Leon was one of my most favorite shoots. We spent four days shooting, and we created several incredible photo sets. We managed to explore the park and found some amazing locations, including the place we stayed.

A Moment with Jova on St. Patrick’s Day 2022

(y’know, because we care)

Gloria Leonard once famously described the difference between Art and Pornography as, “The lighting.” … While that may not be entirely accurate these days, it could be a fun conversation starter should you wish to connect with Jova via Instagram or Patreon. … Nothing good ever came from starting a conversation poorly.

Erotic Color

Posted on by Team Penthouse

Go with the Flow

Artist Lara McKenzie creates erotic watercolor illustrations from a female point of view under the moniker Wet Strokes Art. Penthouse spoke with Lara about how the COVID-19 pandemic kick-started the company, where her inspirations come from, and how she uses her artworks to empower other women to harness their sexuality.

How did you come to create Wet Strokes Art?

I’ve always done something to do with art. I’d say it was innate; it’s always been part of my being. Throughout school I studied fine art and textiles, and after school, I was trying to decide between the two, and I ended up doing a Diploma of Arts in Fashion Design at Australia’s National Art School. I ran my own fashion label for a while, but I’ve always had my heart in painting, so it didn’t last. Basically, I went back to painting and spent quite a period of time playing with a lot of different styles from hyperrealistic oil painting to acrylic abstractions. I was introduced to watercolor about five years ago, and it was a real aha moment for me.

Through oil painting, acrylic and watercolor, I was always painting suggestive flowers, and I was kind of on the periphery of erotic art. I never honed in on erotic art until I created Wet Strokes Art. Now I do that full-time. Wet Strokes Art was actually my COVID baby! I was painting but moving between styles and genres. I delved into erotic art around February 2020, and Wet Strokes Art was born.

What is it about watercolor that lends itself to erotic art?

As far as watercolor goes, I find it quite expressive and free. I like the analogy that I’m playing the alchemist with watercolor because you’re mixing water and pigment together and creating different mediums and textures, and you never quite know what the outcome is going to be. There’s a bit of the unknown, while at the same time there are elements of surrender and control with watercolor, which I thought was a really good analogy for intimate moments.

What draws you to creating art?

I find erotic art really exciting. There is so much potential for inspiration. I like creating art that celebrates sensuality, sexuality and passion. Not everyone is comfortable talking about sex, and I like that art can be a way of opening that dialogue.

Also, I’m a private, introverted person, so art is how I best express myself. I also find painting to be quite therapeutic. I’ve had periods of depression and anxiety in the past, and painting has been my therapist to get me through difficult periods. I feel like when I paint, nothing else matters and everything else shuts off. It’s like my meditation, and it brings me a lot of personal fulfilment.

Your art is very sensual and often puts the focus on female pleasure. Is this part of your intention with Wet Strokes Art?

Absolutely. It feels natural for me to portray pleasure from a female point of view, being a woman myself. I wanted to bring intimacy, connection and emotion into my artwork as well. Instead of a disconnected porn stereotype, I try to portray sensitivity through my erotic paintings. I hope my work empowers women and gives them a sense to go and explore. It’s important to remember that women are sexual creatures, too. A lot of the time women forget that, shelve it or prioritize other areas in their lives. I want to empower other women through my art.

What inspires you?

As far as artists, my all-time favorite is Georgia O’Keeffe. I’ve loved her work forever. I think she was so ahead of her time. Her paintings are so feminine and suggestive. She was revolutionary as an artist and as a female artist. As a result of her influence on me, that’s how I got into starting to paint suggestive flowers.

Is your work ever inspired by your own experiences or fantasies?

I would definitely say my own experiences and fantasies inspire my work. For me, for a painting to be successful and to feel like the painting has worked, I have to have a sense of connection to it. I need to feel immersed in what I’m creating. The research side of things can be fun, too.

What’s been the most memorable moment of your erotic career so far?

Besides hearing from Penthouse, the most surreal moment has been when a representative contacted me on behalf of a Middle Eastern sheikh who was interested in my art. They set up a meeting with me and him online, and I was expecting to be commissioned for an artwork. But what he actually wanted was to fly me over and become his in-house artist for him at his home. Although I was flattered, I politely declined!

Because Ms. McKenzie still works when we can all find her, you may do so at Instagram or via her website. Should you follow that Instagram link, you will discover that the company clearly views paintings different from photography.

Eat Rich

Posted on by Team Penthouse

Nothing Exceeds Like Excess

Eat Rich Bar BillThe Founding Fathers’ Bar Tab

A whopping bar bill for a 1787 farewell party for George Washington is still intact. Who needs to read books when you can read bar tabs, right? According to the receipt, what the Founding Fathers drank during their shindig in Philadelphia is enough to put anyone’s binges to shame — and its total would top more than 17 grand in today’s dollars! Keep in mind there were only 55 attendees, and they supposedly packed away 54 bottles of Madeira, 60 bottles of Bordeaux, eight bottles of whiskey, 22 bottles of porter ale, eight bottles of hard cider, 12 jugs of beer, and seven large bowls of spiked punch. Impressive.

Eat Rich Verification: “USA Today” … (because that’s a bastion of scholarly excellence).

Gordon Bennett Jr.’s Cow Yacht

The son of the founder of the New York Herald was born to riches. While his father was well respected for being a hardworking businessman who thrived on making money, Gordon Jr. was merely known for spending it. He once threw a roll of money into a fire simply because it was too large to fit into the pocket of his pants. He bought a whole restaurant because he was annoyed that someone else was sitting in his usual seat. Plus, he had a yacht built with a room especially reserved for a cow, so he could have fresh butter every morning. Believing he would get better butter if the cow was happy, he installed a fan to cool the cow in the heat and supplied a stack of wool blankets to keep it cozy in the cold. 

Eat Rich Verification: “Mental Floss” … (because flossing is important).

Chowing down with King Louis XIV

Imagine eating so much your stomach ends up twice the size as that of the average human. That’s what happened to French King Louis XIV. Louis, who reigned for 72 years until his death in 1715, was renowned for running his daily routines around food. His evening meal took place around 10 p.m. and typically consisted of 20 to 30 dishes. There were hors d’oeuvres and huge pyramids of fruit served, as well as roasts, chicken pies, turkey, duck, boar, venison, oysters, salmon, sardines, and even turtles with rice and vegetables. His sister-in-law, Princess Palatine, is recorded as saying, “He could eat four plates of soup, a whole pheasant, a partridge, a large plate of salad, two slices of ham, mutton au jus with garlic, a plate of pastry, all followed by fruit and hard-boiled eggs.” Some guests would join him — not to eat but just to sit and watch him chow down. 

Eat Rich Verification: “The Roaming Boomers” … (They’re old. They wander.)

E. Berry Wall’s Bonkers Wardrobe

You would have found Evander Berry Wall strolling the streets of New York City toward the end of the 19th century. He became a millionaire by the time he hit 18, and when he turned 22, he inherited more millions from his father and grandfather. He famously spent it all on clothes. There are reports he bought 5,000 neckties and 300 pairs of gloves, refused to drink anything except Champagne and once changed his outfit 40 times before lunch. He outdid even himself when he rocked up to a party wearing black patent leather boots up to his hips. 

Eat Rich Verification: “Men’s Flair” … (because sometimes they forget to have any).

Emperor Caligula’s Gold Rush

Yeah, yeah, we know that Emperor Caligula loved wild sex parties, but he also had a fetish for gold. The third Roman emperor, whose reign ran from 37 to 41 A.D., forced his servants to pile up his gold reserves simply so he could roll around on the metal because he loved the feel of it on his skin. He also fed his favorite horse oats mixed with gold, and to show off how rich he was, he served guests loaves of bread made of solid gold. Sometimes, just for the hell of it, he threw it on the ground so he could walk across it.

Eat Rich Verification: “Museum Hack” … (because just walking through the door is SO 2019).

Marie Antoinette’s Chocolatier

Think obscene luxury — then double it. Marie Antoinette loved anything and everything to excess and threw ridiculously lavish parties. The last queen of France before the Revolution had extravagant taste in clothes, accessories and food. Each day, she started with coffee and a pastry and then sat down for a big lunch, which sounds pretty standard. But some of her snacks included macaroni, cheese and vegetables cooked in cream. And she loved sweets and desserts: petit fours, crystallized fruits, wafers and whatever her staff could serve up to make her eyes dance. She loved chocolate so much she had her own chocolatier at the Palace of Versailles. The wife of King Louis XVI especially liked liquid chocolate, which she drank with whipped cream. 

Eat Rich Verification: “Histoires de Parfums” … (because it’s in French, so it’s gotta be fancy).

As you likely pick up on by this point, we ended up in some pretty bizarre places in our efforts to verify the blithe claims made in the first Penthouse Magazine issue this year — which fit the space they needed to fill exactly, by the way. Not that they would just make things up for sure, but MSPUIYI and Tahlia Paris were pretty darned distracting, so we could not blame them if they got distracted for a second. … Well, in our digital travels we ran across a wonderfully illustrated list of the most expensive food in the world. While we would not normally send people off to click-bait sites, we found the pictures and the information — NOT fact checked, btw — wonderful and facinating.

Around here we ended up really, really wanting to taste chocolate pudding that costs $35,000 a serving. Sadly, we could not get a volunteer to pay for it (let alone share it). We also have some serious doubts about being able to run that through the expense account for reimbursement. So if any of you out there ever make it to the wilds of England to try it, please let us know what you think. Oh, and if you install the free privacy-protecting DuckDuckGo browser extention, it will block all those annoying tracking ads, by the way.

Highlife Dreams

Posted on by Team Penthouse

Highlife Dreams of the New Season

Granted, some people think these “style” sections can be a little silly on occasion, but honestly we really like the chance to play a little “What if …” every month or so. Highlife Dreams are wonderful. Who wants to dream of stuff that seems possible, after all? Those folks need better dreams.

Lamborghini CountachBack to the Future

Impressed? Yeah, so are we.

Automobili Lamborghini recently unveiled this beauty — the Countach LPI 800-4, a futuristic limited edition with performance every bit as hot as its looks. The design and boundary-pushing technology in this hybrid-electric sports car fall nothing short of exquisite.

With its aspirated V12 engine and Lamborghini’s hybrid super capacitor technology, the Countach LPI 800-4 retains the inimitable V12 experience and sound. Its longitudinally positioned engine combines with the hybrid technology developed for the Sián FKP 37 to deliver peak Lamborghini performance.

“It is a Lamborghini that innately expresses the marque’s enduring and emotive power: always inspirational and thrilling to see, hear and most of all drive,” says Automobili Lamborghini President and CEO Stephan Winkelmann.

The original Countach launched in 1974 and became the poster car of the ’80s. With its fresh design, featuring the sharply angled “Italian Wedge” shape, the Countach was unlike any other car on the market and was the ultimate symbol of an ultra-cool lifestyle. This new version retains the unconventional motif, pushing the brand into the now — and the future.

The Countach utilized the best available technologies to produce an extraordinary car, and this visionary philosophy reflects in the Countach LPI 800-4 and its modernized profile. It develops the original model’s characteristic lines to create a new realization of the iconic automobile’s design.

The new Countach has no fixed rear wing outside the pure lines, featuring air scoops integrated fluidly in the strong shoulders of the car. Never fear Lamborghini veering too far astray, though, as vintage vehicle’s distinctive slatted gills remain in this modern marvel, er, model.

We left out the list of specs on this car that appeared in the magazine, because we honestly didn’t know how many people would be that interested. (You can visit with the “Lambo” online if you really want to pump up those Highlife Dreams.) In brief terms, it does go from 0 to 60 mph in less than 3 seconds, so merging into the freeway will be a breeze, although top speed falls a little under 3½ times the national speed limit, so plan accordingly for getting from point to point. Depending upon where you live, you’re either going to get to your friend’s house really, really fast … or you might be calling that friend to come bail you out of jail. It just depends.

Nippon Erotica: Shunga CollectionWatch and Learn

You know when you want to get laid. Now, how do you make sure women get that vibe from you, too? (HINT: “Drooling” would be a bad answer.)

In 17th century Japan, high-class society utilized watches as pickup tools. UNDONE’s Nippon Erotica: Shunga Collection appears as a modern interpretation of that aesthetic.

Consider these watches business in the front, party in the back. Obviously you have the watch face to actually tell the time — honestly sort of a must-have in the world of top watches, we have learned — but the watch face also features, an abbreviated glimpse of an amorous couple at play, no matter what the time of day.

Now comes the fun part, though. Flip the watch over, and you’ll reveal a full image of the pair from the face of the piece engaging in sex. Sort of a piece on a piece, as it were.

Cool, huh?

Established in 2014 as the world’s leading custom wristwatch label, UNDONE has once again hit the mark on unique personal accessories. An entire team of industry veterans operates the company with a singular goal of ensuring that each of their unique watches go beyond functional fashion: They tell stories.

UNDONE’s Shunga Collection explores both the art of escapism by high society in the 17th century and shunga, a type of Japanese erotic art usually executed in the style of ukioy-e. The company has limited each of the collection’s two styles — Edo and Meiji — to 300 pieces worldwide, and every watch possesses a unique serial number.

Translated literally, the word shunga means “picture of spring.” With a little bit of cultural awareness added to the mix, you might know that “Spring” happens to be a common Japanese euphemism for sex. (That sort of adds a whole new depth to “putting a little spring in your step” now, doesn’t it?)

If you want a striking watch that also works as a conversation starter — not to mention a signal to potential partners who are also on the prowl — you have found it! 

Kind of adds a whole new realm of possibilities to hanging around the bar, right? Picture asking someone, “Can you hold my watch for me while I play this game of pool?” … If you actually make it TO the game of pool, you clearly asked the wrong person. It beats the heck out of waiting until 2:00 a.m. if you happen to pick the right person, though. (Undone Watches)

Luxurious and Highlife Dream LOUD

Imagine a Collaboration. … OK. Now imagine no more.

Everyone seems like they want to collaborate these days, and long may it continue, we say. It would have taken a true visionary to have pictured outlandish L.A. skate brand Palm Angels trading ideas with Vilebrequin, a Saint-Tropez swimwear stalwart, though, but that happens to be exactly what we have here. Oddly enough, the similarities have started to become clear.

Both of these brands tout luxury that screams expression. Whether you’re in downtown L.A. or sailing through the Mediterranean, you still need and want to be seen, right? More importantly you want to be seen and envied. Enter our two outlandish co-conspirators, now, and start planning your next beach blast.

The Highlife Dream collaborative collection between Palm Angel and Vilebrequin, as you may have guessed, centers around shorts. You’ll find them playful, colorful, basically everything you want for fun in and around the water, and probably more, based on the attention you’ll be getting. From camouflage colors for those who favor Palm Angels, to beautiful teddy bears for those who like the extroverted French touch, the fun-loving sunshine crowd can find something for everyone.

Each pair features a double Palm Angels/Vilebrequin logo on the front of the waistband — just in case others aren’t as sure about the quality you have wrapped around your bum. As well as appealing to the eye, though, this collab also focuses on appealing to the planet-conscious crowd. All shorts are made from 100 percent recycled polyamide, meaning less overall environmental impact. Make your imprint with your cheeks, not your carbon footprint, after all.

Compared to some of the items we feature in this Highlife section, a $360 price tag for shorts this awesome almost feels like a bargain. These did run as a one-off promotion, though, so maybe grab some before they all jump ship?

Nighttime Fashion Takes a Bow as Well

Now Imagine dressing like Brad Pitt.

… And then you’ll need to keep imagining, because we did not have permission to use Brad’s image on the site here. He looked darn good in the magazine, though. And we did show you pictures of the nifty board shorts, which almost counts, we figure.

Look at it this way, you could always Subscribe to the Print or Digital Editions, and then you’d see all the pictures all the time — including the ones that feature the ever-popular Fashion Au Naturale. Seriously. People love that line.

So we have a little Highlife Dream fun every so often, and we like to hope. Without hope, what do we have in life really? … We have reality, that’s what. And reality bites a great deal of the time.

Shibari

Posted on by Team Penthouse

Erotic Rope Bondage

We’re not saying that you will instantly convince your partner to submit to being tied up if you simply claim you want to do so because of the beauty you will create together, but calling it “Shibari” can’t hurt as a way to broach the topic.

The word itself is specific to tying or binding, but the practice is actually an art form that includes the wrist-knot chain, knot-tying of hands and chest bind — which is a figure-eight knot — as well as more advanced techniques, as you progress.

Shibari — a building of trust

Originating in 13th century Japan, the artistic form of Japanese rope bondage has had many different interpretations throughout its history. Most of the art form comes from the modification of judicial hojojutsu — the ancient Japanese martial art of restraint using cordage — and ukiyo-e woodblock prints of various torture techniques and methods for restraining and punishing prisoners.

The word for the Japanese practice of Shibari literally means “to tie,” and today it is treated as a consensual experience for the purposes of art or arousal with a rigger — “top” or “dom” — tying up another person, a “bottom,” “sub” or “bunny.” The Japanese art of kinbaku, or tight binding, is primarily aesthetic, as opposed to the more provocative art Shibari aims to express.

“The intricate practice delves into intimacy, trust, and bliss.”

Beauty in Suffering

The intricate practice delves into intimacy, trust and bliss via a ceremonial and delicate process.

The practitioner is binding their partner with a specially treated jute rope, and depending on the top, they may use diverse forms and styles of binding.

Connective Rope is a practice that focuses on touch, feel and arousal and builds connections with the submissive through intimate rope play, closeness, touch, pace and rope placement.

Alternatively, Artistic Rope concerns itself with aesthetics, including contorting the body, morphing limbs and body parts through binding or suspension, and highlighting and pulling parts inward or outward to define and enhance form and shape.

One reaches Beauty in Suffering when the subject is positioned in contortions designed to create controlled reactions toward a certain experience. These stress positions are enhanced by the pacing and timing of the session.

As an art, Shibari can be as delicate, soft and beautiful — or as harsh — as the practitioner desires. A common attribute observed about Shibari is the building of trust among participants.

Ultimately Trust resides as the key ingredient in all Shibari pursuits. The artist must develop on the sub’s journey to rope space, where the bound partner will go through a series of consensual gates and will no longer try to control their environment, becoming relaxed and entering a state of bliss. The rope adopts the role as the messenger in this journey, aiding in the transition from one mindset to another. Some say Shibari can reduce anxiety and depression while promoting an improved mental well-being for up to a week after a session.

Intimacy and devotion

Shibari requires years of dedication and practice, and a true practitioner treats the rope itself with great respect.

Jute is the cord of choice, burnished and bathed in beeswax and camellia oil, and slowly baked. This process gets repeated to create a soft yet strong binding rope. The artist matches concern for the subject being tied by the ceremonial care of the rope. A unique trust, respect and detailed understanding of one another results from Shibari performed expertly.

The art form requires a mastery of intricacy, a balance of the body and mind. On a primary level, the rope requires careful placement and an understanding of the subject’s sensitive areas. The rigger must be careful not to pinch vulnerable nerves, to keep blood flowing to the fingertips and toes and watch for any discoloration.

The dangers of a suspension without proper considerations can be permanent muscle and nerve damage, extreme exhaustion, collapse, fainting and intense muscle cramps. So one must always pay close attention to the process and the partner, Let your passion and an appreciation of elegance be your guides. Just take it easy and enjoy the learning process!

Aaron McPolin is an artist, photographer and videographer. His work delves into areas of subculture, shining a light on taboo realms, and is inspired by psychology, history and the challenging of social norms. Read more and shop on his website:

Shibari artist: Paul Kabzinski … As with most educational aspirations, while you can learn a great deal for free, for true excellence you likely need to learn from someone who makes a living in the art. In that vein (so to speak), we offer Shibari Study. If you’re just not up for twenty-five bucks a month, though, looking for videos on sites trying to sell you “gear” can be illuminating as well. As one might imagine, the rope used in this art tends to be of critical importance, so we can suggest deGiotto Rope as a place to peruse those ties that bind. … Yeah, sorry again. You should hear all the horrible puns the boss lady nixed. This one had us tied up in knots.