Mahina Florence Becomes 2026 Playmate Of The Year

This one might feel more like 2012 Stab… but how could we not?

Today, Playboy announced Mahina Florence as its 2026 Playmate of the Year, making the North Shore-raised model and waterwoman the first Kānaka Maoli, or Native Hawaiian, to receive the honor.

Mahina’s relationship with the magazine began last year, when she appeared as Miss April in Playboy’s Winter 2025–26 issue. Apparently, that went well.

When Playboy called to tell her she’d graduated to Playmate of the Year, Mahina’s response was appropriately suspicious: “Are you sure? No take-backs. You got the right girl?”

They did.

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And, while we have a habit of introducing Mahina via her husband, Nathan Florence, she’s had a legitimate career of her own long before becoming Mrs. Florence.

Raised on Oahu’s North Shore and the daughter of Kai “Borg” Garcia, Mahina has modeled for the likes of Nike, Lululemon, Target and Coca-Cola, and appeared in British Vogue, Shape and Forbes. She’s also the subject of a 14-story Kamea Hadar mural in ‘Aiea, reportedly the largest portrait in Hawai‘i.

Surfing has remained threaded through much of her work. Mahina has appeared in Billabong projects, worked with us on The Pick-Up, worked as a beach reporter at the Vans Pipe Masters, and regularly finds herself behind the camera documenting Nathan’s increasingly unreasonable attempts to get swallowed by waves large enough to alter international algorithms.

In a 2022 interview with Honolulu Magazine, she spoke about entering an industry where women who looked like her weren’t always considered particularly marketable, crediting her grandparents with teaching her to remain proud of her Hawaiian identity.

Now, four years later, she’s sitting atop one of modeling’s stranger and more enduring institutions.

Yet another accolade for the Florence Christmas card.