Like most lido spotters, I can’t look at a bit of open water without wanting to hurl myself into it. Be it the sea, a pool, a river, a puddle even … I get a twitchy feeling. It must be got into. Others see a bracing, flu-inducing pond. The lido nut sees a glistening pool lined with mermaids, luring them in. You might say it’s a condition.
But lately, it seems we lido-lovers are not alone. The Outdoor Swimming Society is pushing 20,000 members. This year, yet more of Britain’s sleeping lidos – from Otley to Saltdean to Broomhill – are on track for resurrection. And this 17-18 September sees the inaugural National Lido Conference, hosted at Portishead Lido: an official lido love-In for UK pool operators and swimmers, run by Lido Girl.
For many, the pursuit of the open-air pool isn’t a sport; it’s a quasi-religious, year-round way of life. Clearly, there’s something in the water. Is it because we’re all 90% water? Is it an amniotic flashback? For me, it’s being able to float on your back under open sky without having to separate out your liquids and eat a microwaved panini on a budget airline. Lidos are going on holiday without any of the anxiety. At once quintessentially British, yet also a piece of the Riviera on your doorstep,– which is handy, now that foreign travel is about to get more expensive.
So it’s no surprise that the hashtag (splashtag? sorry) #LidoLove is now so popular. When I first volunteered to help publicise Peckham Lido’s crowdfunding campaign, I had no idea I’d be quite so drenched in the stuff. But take it from me, #LidoLove is well and truly upon us.
So what is Lido love? Well, Lido love is…
- All the campaigners giving up their time for free, while juggling other milestones in their lives, from weddings to babies and book deals to oh, building a swimming pool in the Thames. Perhaps it’s because on some level we still believe what Herbert Morrison, leader of the LCC said in 1937: “One day, London will be a city of lidos, and you’ll never have to walk for more than a mile to reach one.”
- It’s deciding to invite hundreds of scantily clad strangers to gather at the derelict lido for a “splashmob” photo-shoot and picnic on the day of the Wimbledon final. It’s knowing it’s impractical, but doing it anyway. Much like Herbert’s dream to build 300 lidos in a land that has two weeks of sunshine a year.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=WH_tuQpzGNM%3Fwmode%3Dopaque%26feature%3Doembed
- It’s Lawrence from local Dulwich business Rouiller White writing in to say he’d swum in the lido as a child, and had been heartbroken when it was bulldozed in 1987. So much so, he’d liberated the original pool water-temperature sign, which he :would be delighted to return should the lido reopen:. The sign made a brilliant Splashmob prop.
- It’s London Fields (my local lido, and would-be rival to Peckham) displaying a poster for us and even donating a bunch of lifeguard rescue boards and floats for our shoot.
- It’s walking home carrying said props, looking like an extra from a poor-man’s Baywatch remake.
- It’s Sadiq Khan throwing 7k into the pot and backing the crowdfunding campaign.
- It’s Katy B, James (Bond) Norton, Isy Suttie and other celebrities tweeting their support
- It’s ordering a megaphone online, only to realise it’s actually a toy
- It’s waking up on the morning of Splashmob to realise that the only water we’d be seeing was the great British drizzle, and no one would want to get their kit off
- It’s Harriet Harman rescheduling her plans so she could come to Splashmob
- It’s Hylda Sims, veteran lido-lover making us cry with her poem about the old lido as she read it in the shrubbery.
- It’s kids from all over SE15 splashing up and down the slip-slide as the sun finally came out
- It’s being amazed when almost 200 people stripped off to their swimmers and pretended to do laps in the overgrown grass, while being directed by a mad-woman with a toy megaphone … resulting in some fun photos for social media and Southwark News
- It’s Southwark Council pledging 10k a few days after Splashmob (after we’d been secretly worried they’d veto the event!)
- It’s a rising fear that we were still never going to hit the target in time, but no one in the team giving up
- It’s frantically trying to write films and copy lines, pursued at every turn by those pesky aquatic puns
- It’s suddenly smashing the target 10 days ahead of schedule – before we’d even finished the film. You might say it’s the sunshine wot won it.
- It’s knowing that, all because a small community came together, that depressed blue wedding cake will hopefully one day turn back into a fountain, flowing into a wonderful heated pool that serves generations to come. If we make it through the next round, tomorrow’s children will learn to swim at Peckham Beach.
- It’s what Sir Josiah Stamp once said: “When we get down to swimming, we get down to democracy.”
- It’s popping to Nunhead to see my old hairdresser Cristina on the day of the Splashmob recce, only for her to tell me she’d just heard about her dearest client passing away. Joyce Andrew had swum in Brockwell Lido aged eight to 80, and was a much-loved legend of the London lido world. She was sadly cremated that day, very close to the site of Peckham lido. Cristina said that had Joyce known, she would have been overjoyed to learn of the possibility of Peckham lido re-opening.
But that’s the thing I’ve learned about #LidoLove. Once you know about it, it’s suddenly everywhere you look. And much like the water, it transcends age, class and time.
Lorelei Mathias is inhouse writer/publicist for Peckham lido. She is also author of new novel Break-up Club (Avon Harper Collins), and a forthcoming non-fiction book about outdoor swimming. Follow her at @loreleimathias and loreleimathias.com
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