Playboy Model Turned Bravo Star Jordan Emanuel on Her Celibacy: ‘I Want Women to Know We Can Make Our Own Rules’

Erica MacLean

Jordan Emanuel burst onto the Bravo scene in 2023 as the star of one of the network’s newest shows, Summer House Martha’s Vineyard, and quickly became a fan favorite for her confidence and unique story. The 31-year-old model first made headlines in 2019 when she was chosen as Playboy’s Playmate of the Year, becoming the first Black Playboy bunny to hold that title as well as Playmate. But while Emanuel found her Playboy experience both exciting and empowering, the impact on her dating life was anything but.

So, Emanuel made what some may consider a drastic choice: She decided to go celibate for a full year. That year just so happened to coincide with the filming of Summer House, leading fans to get a full view of Emanuel as she fought for her agency and worth against men and a world who made assumptions about her sexuality and her dating life just because of what she does for work.

Here, Emanuel, who is currently starring on the Bravo spin-off series Winter House, tells Glamour about how she found empowerment in a world that sexualized her from an early age, what her vow of celibacy taught her, and why she thinks all women should embrace loving themselves before focusing on a partnership.

I developed really young. I started wearing a full-size bra when I was 11. In the fifth grade I would walk down to my local grocery store with my best friend, and the amount of calls, people calling from outside the window screaming, the cars going by…. So that definitely was a jarring entrance in femininity. Throughout my teenage years, I definitely looked older than I was. So I think a lot of my experiences with men from a young age was…I was objectified pretty young.

It was usually my grandmothers who would teach me about sex or about our bodies changing, about our periods. And they were like, “Now that you are starting to develop, you will start getting the attention of men. It has nothing to do with you and it shouldn’t change your confidence, but it”s just the reality that we live in as women.” I don’t think that it really hit me until much later in life, honestly, until my 20s, that I was like, “Wait, while it is normal, what is this? Let’s unpack this. This is not how I want to be feeling in every conversation with a man. I don’t want to feel like prey.”

My dating life was most active when I was in college. When I was in high school and college, I was definitely one of those girls that always had a roster and always was talking to somebody or dating somebody. That quickly changed as I got older. I was on and off with somebody from high school until I was 23. Then after that, I went into hibernation and I haven’t really come out. I’ve dated here and there, but no official relationship.

I started modeling after college, in 2015. It kind of happened by accident. I went to school for broadcast journalism and music business; entertainment was always the underlying factor of the career that I wanted. I wanted to do a birthday shoot for my 25th birthday, so my friend and I did this whole shoot, and I got noticed by an agency. When I was younger, I wanted to be a designer or I wanted to be on radio. I remember my mom said something like, “You’re too pretty for the radio.” At the time I was so offended and annoyed that she said that. It always stuck with me because I know she didn’t have the best delivery, but I think what she meant was, Use what you have to make your life a little bit easier.

Once I started doing more shoots and getting more messages from girls, being like, “Thank you so much for doing this. It’s so great to see myself in you,” I realized that the little-girl version of me was starting to come out. Like everybody would have an American Girl that would look like us, and we had Addy, but she was a slave girl. I’m like, Well, that’s not what I look like. I don’t relate to this, so what else do we have?

I went to private school my whole life. So in a lot of scenarios I really was the only Black girl in certain situations. It was great to see Aaliyah or Tyra Banks or people who at least represented us, but it still was like, Okay, but they don’t necessarily look like a regular girl—I’m 5'5", they’re 5'10". Where are the rest of us? So I think my mom definitely opened my eyes in that way and reminded me a lot of how important it was to have representation and be a part of that too. Especially behind the scenes. People weren’t matching my makeup, right? They didn’t know what to do with my hair, things like that.

After my Playboy experience, a lot of the guys I’d be seeing, and even people I would be really into and considered going to the next level in a relationship with, at the beginning they would love playing like, “Oh, we didn’t even know you were a Playboy model.” But then I would meet their family, and their family was like, “Oh, is this the Playmate?” So they were selling that. Or I’d meet their friends and then it would come up. So then I realized, You were using that to describe me instead of all the other qualities that I have. You’re the person I’m seeing and sleeping with, and this is how you’re pitching me to your friends. And so that’s when I really took a step back and was like, I need a break.

I feel like there’s something with the patriarchy that they still can’t handle a confident woman. And when you can’t handle a confident woman, you try to bring them down. The bragging about the model thing or bragging about Playboy or whatever anybody has done, it’s like you’re using that as an award for your value. When in reality, it had nothing to do with me trying to be the entertainment for men. I was confidently being vulnerable in my own skin, and I think that a lot of the time men don’t know what to do with that. So instead of embracing that, encouraging it, and uplifting the power of somebody feeling comfortable in their own body, they want to diminish it and make it something to own. To me, it’s just an insecurity thing more than anything else. Instead of making it, “This is something that Jordan did because she is confident and wow, isn’t that so powerful?” It’s like they take your power and put it on themselves like, “Oh, I’m so great because I’m with her.”

I was like, “You know what? I’m going celibate. I am going to focus on me. I’m going to do me. I’m not going to use sex as a distraction. I won’t partake in any activities unless it’s my official boyfriend.” Then I was like, “I don’t even want to have a boyfriend right now. I like my freedom and discovering what I like.” I wouldn’t say my decision was directly linked to Playboy. It just happened to be the straw that broke the camel’s back.

For the most part it was pretty easy. I had people that I liked and I had people that I’d make out with, but it wasn’t that hard to be honest. I feel like I learned a lot about myself. I learned a lot about my former self and relationship and where things went wrong. When you think about it, for the majority of my life, I wasn’t having sex right up until the moment I lost my virginity. To me, it was like that’s when I had a lot of my most meaningful relationships, because you really are just getting to know somebody from the inside out. I valued myself so much more after I prioritized myself in setting boundaries, even with girlfriends. To me, it was almost like a little distraction had been taken out of the mix, and I was allowed to focus on what I needed to be focusing on at that time.

In summer 2022, Jordan Emanuel filmed the first season of the Bravo show Summer House: Martha’s Vineyard, which premiered in 2023. The show filmed in the middle of Emanuel’s year of celibacy. In one memorable scene, two men in the house discuss with Emanuel that one of them had “called dibs” on her, leading to her impassioned response that no one can, actually, do that.

I’ve always prided myself on being honest and authentic and being myself. That’s really how I went into this Bravo experience. I was just like, Okay, I’m just going to be me, and that’s it. That was just a real part of what was going on in my life. I was actively in that one year of celibacy. It just felt weird at the time because I felt so much pressure to be dating or be giving the guys in the house a chance and feeling pressure from them. It was an interesting juxtaposition, and I think that’s what really also helped be open about it. Like, “Listen, I’m not at that point in my life right now. I’m not kissing any of y’all. And that’s that.”

Even though I didn’t know about the dibs comment at the moment, when we were filming, it felt that way. It very much became apparent to me that it was as if I was just a piece of property that everybody was just going to sign a piece of paper and they could get to claim ownership over her. That’s what it really felt like. And I don’t think that was either of anybody’s intention, but it’s how it felt. I wasn’t quite convinced that they were respecting me as a human outside of the things that I’ve done for work.

A lot of people, even to this day, messaged me about that and feel really seen and relate to that moment. Then you have the other people who are like, “Well, you did Playboy.” What do you mean? Me modeling for a magazine does not prevent me from having boundaries with people. Unfortunately, I think it really represents the misogyny that we all still live with. Most of the comments were from women...honestly, I feel a little sad for them. To me, it means you’re not okay with your freedom and you’re not okay with somebody else expressing that said freedom.

I love Playboy. So many of the women go on to be doing amazing things. I mean, look at Pamela Anderson. We know Pamela Anderson from Playboy, and she’s still kicking ass and setting trends and doing all these things. I felt like it was one of the few platforms that really let women be women and be free in the liberation of nudity. I didn’t join a sorority in college, but it felt that when I went into Playboy, I joined a sorority in a way, and I met so many amazing people behind the scenes and in front of the camera. We call each other Playmate sisters, and it was such a great group of women. For me, it was a really empowering platform and a great way to meet a bunch of people. And it reaches so many people internationally. I just felt really liberated, honestly, and really uplifted. I got to write my own article, and they were always open to any suggestions that I had creatively. It felt really empowering. I really don’t know how else to put it. I think it turned into something else for other people. It didn’t take away from it though, because I think the good outweighs the bad. I got so many more positive reactions than negative ones.

That year mark for my celibacy was September 2022. I’ve gone on some dates, I’ve hung out with some people, but no one new. It’s always been somebody that I’ve known for 10 years or had a previous actual healthy relationship with. But even then, it’s just been dry. I haven’t gone on one date this entire year of 2023. That wasn’t really conscious. In this past year, I just got so much busier and I was very much in season with these shows. So I really didn’t feel like I had a moment to even catch up for myself, let alone then go spend that time investing in anybody else.

Ultimately, I want women to know that we can make our own rules. It’s our life to live. It’s our body to share or not. We don’t have to play by everybody else’s rules or by what everybody else is thinking about us. They’re going to judge us regardless. So you may as well do what makes you happy as long as you’re safe and you’re not hurting anybody or hurting yourself. If that is celibacy, that’s amazing; if it’s not, great. I just want us to decide for ourselves what that looks like and what those boundaries are for us and embrace them.

This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.

Originally Appeared on Glamour