Demi Moore did it most famously, when she posed for the cover of Vanity Fair wearing only some bling bling jewellery, whilst seven months pregnant with her daughter Scout
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Now, news agency Reuters reports that Japanese women are increasingly choosing to have their pregnancies immortalised with nude photographs. It says that the craze is particularly popular amongst older first time mums who are likely to only have one child - they want to capture this once in a lifetime body shape in all its maternal glory.
I've written previously about how I think we should all celebrate the specialness of our post-pregnancy bodies, and looking at this, I think the Japanese women are definitely onto something. A full, ripe, pregnant belly is a thing of beauty, is it not? Though I don't know if I'd be passing those snaps round the in-laws at the next family gathering.
However, if you had one of those pregnancies where you spend half the time feeling like a stranded elephant, you wouldn't be so keen to see it captured on film either.
Three years ago the Japanese government demanded the removal of a subway poster featuring a nude and pregnant Britney Spears because, they said, it might arouse male commuters. Times have obviously changed.
Yomiko Yoda is not interested in becoming a subway poster. She gave birth to a son on July 19 and has nude photos documenting her pregnancy, but they're strictcly for home viewings only.
"Whenever I see these pictures, I can recall how I looked and how happy I was when I was pregnant," she told Reuters. "This moment will not come back to me, and these pictures are for my own enjoyment."
The trend is credited to Japanese pop singer Hitomi, who posed nude when she was pregnant last June- the image appeared on Tokyo billboards to promote her new album. A subsequent photo book sold some 10,000 copies during its first week of publication.
Photographer Natsuko Takada, who charges 35,000 yen, or around £220 for photos like these, told Reuters: "When I opened my studio for maternity photos last year, we had less than 10 customers per month. But last month we had 70 customers." Looks like this trend is on the increase.
What do you think of this? Would it catch on in the UK or are we too reserved?
Source [ParentDish US]