International Bikini Atoll Day

Written and Cultivated by Miss Daisy Jai (J. Jordan w/ ai)

Three years ago, I learned why the bikini is called the bikini. Like many people, I had worn one countless times without ever asking where the name came from. When I discovered it had been named after Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands, where an Indigenous community was displaced so the world’s newest and most powerful weapon could be tested, I couldn’t stop thinking about it.

On July 1, 1946, the first nuclear test at Bikini Atoll forever changed the lives of the Bikinians. They had agreed to temporarily leave their ancestral home after being told their sacrifice would be “for the benefit of mankind.” Whatever they understood about nuclear technology at the time, few could have imagined the long shadow that radiation, displacement, and decades of uncertainty would cast over their community.

On July 5, 1946, French designer Louis Réard introduced a daring new swimsuit. Hoping its debut would be just as “explosive” as the headlines dominating the world’s newspapers, he named it the bikini.

The swimsuit became famous. In time, the people of Bikini Atoll largely faded from public awareness.

When I first learned this history, my instinct was simple: maybe we should rename the bikini. That idea became one of Permaculture Pinup’s earliest awareness campaigns: Rebrand Bikini.

We invited our community to imagine a name that could carry a different story into the future. One suggestion immediately stood out, the "To Peace" (offered by Terri Zacati).. We loved it.

We didn't expect the world to abandon the word bikini, but hoped it could redirect some of the conversation around it. From war toward peace. From destruction toward possibility. However, as we continued researching and learning from the history of Bikini Atoll, we came across perspectives from Bikinians expressing something we hadn’t fully considered. Painful as the association may be, the swimsuit’s name remains one of the few moments when much of the world (maybe just maybe) remembers Bikini Atoll at all. Removing the name altogether could unintentionally make the people even less visible.

Our thinking evolved. And in many ways, that’s permaculture! Observe and interact. Accept feedback.

Creatively use and respond to change.

So rather than replacing the conversation, we expanded it.

Model: Missy Hartley - Photog: KaytiBunny - Adornment Miss Daisy Jai - Location: Anamaya Yoga + Health Retreat Center

Permaculture Pinup has always been about more than photographs.

Historically, pin-up imagery has often been intertwined with wartime morale, military iconography, and ideas of conquest. Our project asks a different question:

What if we could reclaim sex appeal and enlist beauty in service of regeneration?

Beauty like sunlight and water, can nourish whatever we choose to grow. Our choice has always been to use creativity, femininity, and yes, even sex appeal, in service of regeneration rather than destruction.

To celebrate pollinators instead of propaganda. Healthy forests instead of battlefields. Living oceans instead of radioactive ones. To drop seeds, not bombs.

This year’s International Bikini Atoll Day campaign features yoga teacher Missy Hartley, whose story felt perfectly aligned with the spirit of remembrance and renewal.

Ten years ago, Missy arrived at Anamaya Resort in Costa Rica for her honeymoon with her husband, David.

At the end of that first visit, she turned to him and said, “One day I’m going to teach yoga here.” Today, she does, and together with David.

Their retreat, Awaken Your Path, recently returned to Anamaya for a second year, where they share yoga, partner yoga, and a philosophy rooted in balance, presence, and connection. Long before becoming a yoga teacher, however, Missy had another dream.

She fell in love with vintage pin-up photography and eventually created her own pin-up calendar. That creative confidence grew into lingerie modeling and, ultimately, into fulfilling a lifelong goal of appearing in Playboy. Yet when she reflects on that journey today, the accomplishment she speaks about most isn’t the publication. It’s confidence. It’s learning to feel at home in her own body. It’s discovering that the photographers she chose treated her with professionalism and respect. And it’s realizing that what she loves most now is helping other women feel comfortable in their own skin.

“There’s definitely a power there. When we open up to it because we simply feel good, we get to shine that energy out. It’s better for everyone.”

That perspective resonates deeply with yoga. And it resonates with permaculture, too.

Observe before intervening. Work with nature rather than forcing outcomes. Care for the Earth. Care for people. Share fairly.

Consent may not appear explicitly within the ethics, yet it quietly lives inside them. Healthy ecosystems don’t flourish through domination. Neither do healthy communities. Whether we’re tending soil, creating photographs, teaching yoga, or building relationships, thriving begins often observation. Listening before acting. Respecting before taking. Creating with rather than acting upon. During our conversation, Missy also shared advice that deserves repeating.

Before working with photographers, she built trust first. She asked questions. She reviewed their work. She listened to her intuition. Whenever possible, her husband accompanied her to shoots.

Then she offered one simple piece of guidance:

“If a photographer tells you not to bring anyone, run away.”

Healthy creative spaces are built on trust. This is social permaculture.

There was something especially meaningful about creating this year’s images at Anamaya. It feels fitting that a campaign rooted in remembrance would unfold in a place devoted to healing.

For Missy, it is where a honeymoon became a vocation. For me, it is a place where I have taught yoga retreats and where, this September, I’ll return to host Anamaya’s first Mermaid Retreat alongside KaytiBunny, co-creatrix of Green Wave's Permaculture Pinup initiative. Together, KaytiBunny and I are also members of the nearby intentional permaculture community, Rancho Delicioso that is an extension of Anamaya.

Green Wave’s mission is simple: Inspiring waves of change.

We don’t expect one article, one photograph, or one campaign to transform the world overnight.

We trust something much older than certainty. We trust that inspiration moves like water. One person learns a forgotten story. Another shares it with a friend. Another creates art. Before long, a wave has formed, carrying more people than any one of us could have reached alone.

Our goal with International Bikini Atoll Day iisn’t to make people feel guilty for wearing bikinis.

It’s to make it impossible to wear one without also knowing the story and the Bikinian people behind its name.

Whether this day is ever formally recognized or simply grows through community, we invite you to join us each July 1.

🌊 Learn about Bikini Atoll and the people whose homeland gave the bikini its name.

📖 Share the story with someone who has never heard it.

👙 If you wear a bikini or to-peace today, pause for a moment of gratitude and remembrance.

🌱 Plant something. Drop seeds, not bombs.

🐚 Support ocean conservation, Indigenous communities, or local ecological restoration projects.

💙 Create your own ripple. Green Wave exists to inspire waves of change, trusting that every act of remembrance, restoration, and kindness travels farther than we can see.

Peace, like permaculture, is something we cultivate together.