Page 86 - FAST 2026 Calendar Yearbook

Sophie Francesconiphotographed by
Jim Gianatsis
In case you hadn’t noticed (Ha!) this year’s
Iron & Lace and Garage Girls Calendars featured
Calendar Kitten is red haired and freckle faced Sophie
Francesconi from the small town of Massarosa in the
Tuscany region of Italy, about 30 miles north of Florence.
At 21 years old Sophie has been a full-time university
student now interning to become a professional nurse.
Sophie was discovered on Instagram by our
contributing Italian photographer Simon de Raineri who
has tested and shot with her a couple of times. And he
refered Sophie to me when I asked if he knew of a pretty
Italian model who could shoot with me when I visited
Rome two years ago at the start of my Edelweiss World
Motorcycle Tour ‘From Rome to Sicily’. You can see that
feature story in last year’s FAST 2025 Calendar Yearbook.
Sophie lives with her parents and older sister in
Massarosa. Being busy with school and living too far from
the major cities like Milan and Rome where there was
photo model work, she was never really able to persue a
professional modeling career. Still, Sophie is very fashion
conscious, she loves to dress up and wear the trendiest
fashions, and does all her own makeup and hair.
When we first met and I first shot with Sophie
in Rome 2 years earlier, she told me it was her dream to
visit Los Angeles. So, of course I invited her to spend the
summer with me in Los Angeles as both a summer
vacation and to shoot for the FastDates.com Calendars.
It all came together 2 year later in the summer of 2024
and shooting for the 2024 Calendars and Yearbook
This was actually Sophie’s first time to travel out
of Italy and even fly on an airplane! Now 21 years old,
Sophie had just finished her university studies and was
ready to beginning her RN nursing internship in the fall of
2024/2025 at a hospital. I was wonderful to give Sophie
such a meaningful graduation present: visiting the place of
her dreams, Los Angeles, before she settled in her nursing
career in Italy, and a big photo shoot as a professional
model.
But our story together hasn’t ended yet! I returned
to Italy in June 2025 to participate in the Historic Mille
Miglia automobile rally in a classic 1969 Alfa Romeo Guilia
open top sports car with Sophie as my co-driver and
model. Look for that story and photographs in the next
2027 FastDates.com Calendars and FAST 2027 Calendar
Yearbook. - Jim Gianatsis
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