Actress Laverne Cox made history this week by becoming the first transgender individual to grace the cover of Cosmopolitan magazine.
The 45-year-old Orange Is the New Black star is set to appear on Cosmo South Africa‘s February 2018 issue, which the magazine is calling its “Say Yes to Love” issue.
“I am so honored and proud to cover the February issue of @cosmopolitanusa,” Cox wrote on her Instagram account Sunday.
“As a black transgender woman, I’ve often been kept a secret by the men that I’ve dated,” Cox said in a video accompanying the shoot. “So when my ex-boyfriend introduced me to his dad and invited me to spend Hanukkah with him and his family, it was the most special thing ever.”
“Trans women deserve to be loved out in the open and in the light,” she added.
Cosmo Editor-in-Chief Holly Meadows said the issue will “look at love in 2018 – including acceptance of self, others, and non-binary relationships.”
Cox has become a leading LGBT activist in Hollywood, and in 2016 became the first transgender actress to play a transgender character on a network television series when she was cast on the CBS legal drama Doubt, which has since been cancelled.
Several influential magazines have included transgender women on their covers for the first time in recent months, including Vogue Paris, and Playboy, which introduced its first transgender “Playmate” in October.
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