Zizi Vlaun, Month of May. (Photo by Skip Churchill)

PARIS - The McLaughlin Foundation Garden has released its third nude calendar, because after its wild success with its first two calendars, the garden proved sex really does sell.

Or, at least, a chaste and respectable organization parodying sexy calendars sells.

The models are people from the area, any age, photographed in and around the garden, digging, pruning, reading. Among those in the new 2007 calendar, there's a popular hair dresser, the director of a regional economic development organization, and a local chef known for his curried chicken sandwiches - all naked.

The garden's first nude calendar in 2003, along with the second one in 2005, made so much money, according to Foundation Director Michael Desplaines, that the garden was able to make significant gains in paying off its $150,000 mortgage.

"We are one of the few public gardens that doesn't charge admission fees," Desplaines said Monday. "Most historical gardens and sites charge some sort of admission fee, so we have to be creative."

The 75-year-old Paris garden received much media attention for its first nude antics from The Cincinnati Post to the American Association of Nude Recreation. The black-and-white calendars have sold in countries around the world, from New Zealand to Hong Kong, Desplaines said.

Photographer Skip Churchill, who has taken the photographs for all three of the foundation calendars, said he has been targeted by many groups seeking to make their own nude calendars, but has declined because he's too busy.

"I have gotten quite a lot of attention," Churchill, of Hebron, said Monday. "Brandeis University - their scientists, a rescue squad from Nova Scotia. They wanted me to come right up."

Nude calendars featuring regular people, a kind of sub-genre of calendars, were popularized by a group of women in Rylstone, England, who posed in the buff to raise money for leukemia and lymphoma research. They became international celebrities, raised a lot of money, and became the subjects of a Hollywood movie titled "Calendar Girls."

Since then, nonprofits have capitalized on the trend, making millions of dollars for their causes, according to the ePhilanthropy Foundation.

Consumers of the McLaughlin Foundation's 2007 calendar, called "Altogether in the Garden," will be treated to the sights of some well-known community figures doing their thing, sans clothes, a kind-of voyeurism that for some reason is ticklishly funny.

"You are browsing through this thing and say, "I know that person, that's the mayor!" That's the best part about it; they are distinguished individuals and they are naked, or assimilated to be," Churchill said.

The artful photographs reveal no off-limit body parts.

"I am Miss February," Karen Fisher, 30, said Monday, releasing a peel of laughter. Fisher is a marketer in the health food industry and lives in West Paris.

Fisher said the photo shoot wasn't awkward, that the models first posed in their clothes and then dropped them briefly for the actual shot. The shoots took place first thing in the morning in May and June to capture the light and to avoid visitors at the center.

The group shot required some communal nudity, though.

"Then we took our clothes off, walked out, got into poses," Fisher said. "Everyone is so not wanting anyone to look at them. You don't want people staring at you, so you didn't stare at anyone else."

Photographed in the buff for the calendar are Jason Robinson, Tova Millett, Bonnie Trundy, Barbra Barrett, Bob Dunning, Lance Deschenes, Heather Nevis, Dave Nevis, Judy Schneider, Zizi Vlaun, Diane Bynion, Brett Doney, Tony Rice and Fisher.

The youngest model in the 2007 McLaughlin Foundation Garden calendar is 7 days old, tiny and bare-bottomed - graphic designer Vlaun's son, Jasper. She is first photographed pregnant with her son for May, and then holds him for the group cover shot.

"I am grateful having this beautiful photograph documenting my pregnancy, and if it helps McLaughlin and makes money supporting what they do, I'll do anything for that," she said.