Is there anything Jonathan Van Ness Can’t do? He’s been smashing records and breaking down boundaries left, right, and centre for years now, and now he has another record to add to his collection: Cosmopolitan’s first solo non-female cover star in 35 years.
Jonathan Van Ness – who is non-binary but uses he/him pronouns – is photographed on the cover wearing an orange and pink gown designed by Christian Siriano, and just generally looking absolutely luminous. Cosmopolitan know what they’ve done too, because the line about him reads “Jonathan Van Ness: Yep, we did it. You’re totally welcome.”
Jonathan himself announced the cover on Instagram, posting the shot captioned “My body is ready.”
Cosmopolitan featured all the guys from One Direction on their cover in December 2012, but the last time a solo non-woman featured was the December 1984 issue, which has Boy George on the cover.
Cosmopolitan UK editor-in-chief Claire Hodgson has said that Jonathan was a wonderful choice for the cover.
“Jonathan is warm, funny, opinionated, kind and brave, all qualities that resonate with our audience,” she said. “He is encouraging people to love who they are, which is at the heart of what our brand stands for – we could all do with a little more self-love in our lives.”
Earlier this year, Jonathan became Essie’s first ever non-female brand ambassador, and opened up about being diagnosed with HIV when he was 25 as part of his memoir, Over The Top. Talking about his HIV diagnosis was an incredibly important moment for him, as well as the entire HIV positive community, who Jonathan describes as “beautiful”.
Jonathan Van Ness is a beautiful human being who is leading the charge for people to be themselves. It’s not always easy to be so open about who you are in this world, but thankfully we have people like Jonathan making it just a bit easier.