The lifestyle businesswoman, 81, is the oldest swimsuit model the magazine has featured, calling the fact "historic."
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Stewart posed in the Dominican Republic for the shoot and appears in a total of ten looks.
"When I heard that I was going to be on the cover of Sports Illustrated Swimsuit, I thought, 'Oh, that's pretty good, I'm going to be the oldest person I think ever on a cover of Sports Illustrated,'" Stewart said, adding, "And I don't think about age very much, but I thought that this is kind of historic."
In a tweet, Sports Illustrated called the cover "epic."
"When we said this year was going to be epic, we meant it," SI tweeted.
Stewart's career began as a model at age 15, before she worked as a Wall Street stockbroker and later started a catering business, which grew into a lifestyle media company.
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Stewart's more recent modeling with social media selfies have gained praise, particularly an image she shared of herself in a pool in 2020.
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