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New European
12-04-2025
- Entertainment
- New European
The nuclear history of the bikini
It's a relic from the time when the atom bomb was considered a symbol of modernity and progress. The device had recently brought the second world war to an end and the nuclear technology on which it was based now promised a cheap and effective source of energy. Many people headed to Nevada test sites to witness the awesome power of the A-Bomb. The atomic age was born and it would deeply influence culture, design and fashion. There's a remarkable image on display at 'Splash! A Century of Swimming and Style', a new exhibition at the Design Museum in London. It features a showgirl named Linda Lawson reclining by the pool at the Sand's Hotel in Las Vegas beaming at the camera. She has a large cotton wool mushroom cloud attached to her head and has just been crowned Miss Cue, in honour of the upcoming Nevada atomic bomb test. 'You've got this moment where atomic power feels quite like a positive,' Amber Butchart, curator of the Splash exhibition, told me, 'It's this thing that the good guys have. Obviously, that then changes as the Cold War develops.' America had revealed the destructive threat of the bomb in 1945, with the destruction of Nagasaki and Hiroshima. But news that the Soviet Union was also developing a nuclear weapon made the US determined to maintain its nuclear pre-eminence. On July 1, 1946, a nuclear device nicknamed 'Gilda' after the recent Rita Hayworth movie, detonated in a remote coral reef in the Marshall Islands called the Bikini Atoll. A few days later, a companion bomb, Helen of Bikini, was detonated in the same area. As a temporary precaution the local inhabitants had been evacuated, assured that the experiments taking place were of vital historical importance. But the evacuation was not temporary. The Bikini atoll is still uninhabited. These nuclear devices, and other even more powerful bombs subsequently tested there, created far higher levels of radioactive residue than was estimated, the devices detonated underwater sending up vast columns of radioactive sea spray. In private, the tests were considered a failure. Russian observers, invited to watch America's mighty new capability, were apparently unimpressed by what they saw. The first bomb, on July 1, was dropped around 600m off target and missed its aim point by such a wide margin that many of the ships anchored in the lagoon went unsunk. But this was not how it was reported. Headlines around the world marvelled at the might of the bomb and the possibilities it held. And, as Linda Lawson showed, it would have an enduring effect on one surprising area in particular: swimwear. One man who took particular interest in the news coming from the Marshall Island was a former civil engineer called Louis Réard. He had inherited his mother's Paris-based lingerie business just as the Second World War had begun and by the end of hostilities, he was looking for a way to reinvigorate his business. Another Frenchman, Jacques Heim, was a distinguished fashion designer who started out in the family fur firm. He'd moved into haute couture during the 1930s and had established a well-regarded fashion house that bore his name. As he was Jewish, he was forced into hiding and became active with the French Resistance. In the 1930s, Heim had dabbled with swimwear, creating a ruffled, two-piece garment that he dubbed the Atome, which was a reference to its atomically small size rather than the power of nuclear weapons (they had yet to be invented). But Heim was ahead of his time – very few people would ever dare to wear such a scandalously skimpy outfit. By after the war, and with atoms suddenly on everyone's lips, he was ready to try and rebuild his business. In June 1946, Heim re-released the Atome at his swimwear outlet in Cannes. To publicise the event, he flew a plane over the beaches of the Côte d'Azur, trailing a banner with the thrilling announcement: 'The Smallest Swimsuit in the World'. Louis Réard also had a new fashion innovation. He'd devised his own item of swimwear, a two-piece, but a two-piece with a difference. For the first time – scandalously – the wearer's navel was revealed. 'Even in periods such as the 1920s when hemlines rose, the navel itself was still not bared,' Amber Butchart says. 'So, it almost becomes symbolic of nudity itself.' Réard's creation consisted of just four triangles of material with a total size of 193 square centimetres. To reinforce the newsworthy nature of his design, the swimsuit's material had a newsprint motif. Emblazoned on the fabric, alongside other newsworthy words, was the name: 'Bikini'. Just a few days after Heim's launch, Réard's new bikini swimsuit was unveiled in Paris at the popular Piscine Molitor swimming pool where a beauty pageant was taking place. After the contestants paraded in their more modest swimwear and a winner was crowned (winning the Réard Cup), a 19-year-old dancer from the Casino de Paris named Micheline Bernardini was sent out in Réard's creation. Bernadini carried a box, the size of a match box, claiming the bikini would easily fit inside. It was a sensation. Réard's bikini knocked its nuclear namesake off the front pages. It's claimed that the International Herald Tribune alone reported nine stories about Mademoiselle Bernardini and her scandalous, navel-revealing outfit. A version of this original bikini can be currently seen at the Splash exhibition alongside other iconic swimwear including Tom Daley's Speedos and Pamela Anderson's Baywatch one-piece. 'The one that we've got on display is still very, very small and wouldn't have been worn by huge amounts of women,' Butchart says. 'But it definitely had an influence on the future of swimwear.' Réard, hearing of Heim's innovations, headed south with the intention of launching his bikini on the rich and influential Côte d'Azur beachgoers. Like his rival, he engineered his own aerial advertising. His cheeky banner read: 'Smaller than the smallest swimsuit in the world.' With that, the bikini wars had begun. Réard patented his creation and became quite litigious if he felt anyone had copied his design or was using the name 'Bikini' without consent. He enjoyed sparring with the press, releasing inflammatory statements such as his claim that a true bikini could easily fit through a wedding ring. He also released a new newsprint edition of the swimsuit every year. But despite all this press, customers favoured Heim's more modest designs, rather than Réard's more revealing offering. Worse, the Catholic Church frowned upon all this bellybutton brandishing, which led to the bikini being banned in Italy, Spain and Portugal. The shock was not confined to Europe: the American Sears catalogue once airbrushed out the navel of a model who wore a two-piece suit. 'It caught on at different times in different places,' Butchart says. 'It took a lot longer in America where there's more prudishness. It was kind of staggered in terms of how quickly it became acceptable.' It wasn't until 1952 that Brigitte Bardot helped to popularise the garment, starring in Manina, the Girl in the Bikini. Underage at the time, Bardot's father sued the production who had promised him they would not exploit his daughter's body for profit. He lost the case. As the fifties drifted into the more permissive sixties, the bikini became de rigueur. Despite Réard's design initially being less popular with beachgoers, and despite its nuclear origins, the bikini name stuck. Réard went on to run his own Paris swimwear shop for the next 40 years. Heim, perhaps stung by the bikini wars, moved away from swimwear and headed further upmarket, clothing the likes of Sophia Loren and Madame Charles De Gaulle. 'What I find really interesting about this rivalry,' Butchart told me, 'is how something so huge and destructive and geopolitical can have this outlet in swimwear. Swimwear designed by men of course, for women.' And while the bikini grew more ubiquitous, its connection to nuclear testing faded from public consciousness, just as the early optimism of the atomic age was morphing into fear. A few weeks after the bikini's launch, John Hersey's Hiroshima was printed in the New Yorker, a book-long essay describing the devastation of that city, and that put a human face on the horrors of a nuclear attack. The Cold War was a time of simmering threat and paranoia. The campy B-movies featuring atomically mutated giant ants or crabs, turned into the dread of films such as Fail Safe and Dr Strangelove. That sense of nuclear threat has never gone away. Bathing beauties wearing mushroom clouds are inconceivable now, with figures such as Putin and Trump in power. But the bikini, this bizarre remnant of the atomic age, still reigns supreme. It's perhaps one of the few reminders of a time when the energy of the atom was considered miraculous and optimistic. But you still aren't allowed to swim in the waters around the Bikini Atoll. It's still too dangerous.
CNN
28-03-2025
- Entertainment
- CNN
Pamela Anderson, ‘explosive' bikinis and the changing tides of swimwear style
High-cut, fire truck red and with a scoop neckline that seemed designed for slow-motion cameras, Pamela Anderson's 'Baywatch' swimsuit — worn by the actor during her tenure on the US TV series from 1992 to 1997 — is one of the most infamous on-screen uniforms of that decade. Now, the storied swimming costume is on display at 'Splash! A Century of Swimming and Style' — a new exhibition at The Design Museum in London, running until August 17 — where it is suspended in a glass case on an invisible mannequin, albeit with erect nipples. It's the crown jewel of the exhibition, which maps the changing tastes and fashion of swimwear through the ages. 'This kind of thing haunted me,' said curator and fashion historian Amber Butchart, nodding at Anderson's red swimsuit, which, she noted, was one of the costliest pieces to insure. 'It was very much part of that '90s culture (which said) 'This is how you're supposed to look,'' Butchart told CNN ahead of the opening, citing the pervasive male gaze that dictated the public perception of female celebrities. 'I think (Anderson has) done such a great job of turning that around and reclaiming her own image.' Anderson began her acting career on 'Baywatch' as C. J. Parker — a lifeguard, volleyball coach and beach café owner from California — who was rarely seen in little more than a tiny red one-piece, with an orange life raft tucked under her arm. Anderson has since worked hard to diversify her public image: writing a plant-based cookbook, going proudly make-up-free on the red carpet and making her arthouse debut with a leading role in Gia Coppola's 2025 indie film 'The Last Showgirl'. But many will remember Anderson most for her role on 'Baywatch', of which she is widely credited with making the most watched TV show in the world, with over 1 billion viewers from more than 140 countries tuning in each week at its height. Many international broadcasters would only buy episodes that Anderson featured in, a condition that was nicknamed 'Pamela Clauses,' according to her memoir. In 2019, to honour the TV series' 30th anniversary, Pantone created a shade called 'Baywatch red.' All the bathing suits worn in 'Baywatch' were custom-made for each actor by the Californian sportswear brand TYR. 'They could highlight whatever they wanted to highlight,' said Butchart, referring to the actors' physiques. So when it came to exhibiting the clothes, a traditional showcase display wouldn't cut it. 'We didn't really want to put it on a mannequin, unless it was the exact proportions of Pamela Anderson,' she told CNN. Instead, the red one-piece hangs in the air — an object in its own right, divorced from the body that brought it fame. Beginning with the cumbersome knitted unitards of the 1920s, visitors of the exhibition are taken on a whistle-stop tour past the first modern bikini in 1946 (morbidly named after the nuclear testing site, Bikini Atoll, because of the two-piece's 'explosive' effect), onto the advent of Speedos and landing at the scuba crepe-turned-couture designs of luxury fashion house Viktor & Rolf. But the showcase is more than just a story of shifting silhouettes; Butchart also chronicles the social power of swimwear. Encased in a Perspex display cabinet is a grim, municipal-looking rental bathing suit over a century old. Emblazoned with the words 'Margate Corporation,' it was among the costumes once offered by the English local council to those who didn't have the means to buy their own. In recent years, brands have sought to make swimming more inclusive through design innovation. A Victoriana blue and white striped gender-neutral suit from Beefcake Swimwear, for example, caters to transgender bodies from XS to XL, while a tri-colored one-shoulder suit from Girls Chronically Rock features special fasteners making it easier for those with disabilities to get dressed. 'Swimwear enables access to public spaces,' explained Butchart. 'So, if you don't have swimwear that works for your body, you are denied that experience.' The exhibition also addresses the pressures that come with going for a dip. Tucked away in one corner of the show are reminders of the oppressive beauty standards pushed by fashion magazines and corporations as soon as swimwear got skimpier. In one 1925 advert for Zip Depilatory cream, copywriters promise freedom from 'unwanted hair' and skin that is 'soft and smooth, really adorable.' A Vogue magazine article a few years later dictated that 'she who decides to discard stockings must also decide to keep her legs absolutely free from hair at all times.' Over the next few decades, swimwear cuts would only get higher and higher. What makes Anderson's 'Baywatch' suit so memorable, Butchart said, was its higher-cut leg — a staple of '80s and '90s swimwear designs — and its one-piece design, a style that has experienced a resurgence in popularity. 'Things had become so bikini-dominated,' she said. 'Then, suddenly, it was fashionable to have a one-piece swimsuit again.' This, plus 'the magic of Pamela,' Butchart added, referring to the star's enduring 'it' factor. On the placard beneath the hallowed swimming costume reads a quote from Anderson on her own swimwear line, designed over 30 years later. 'I think it's great that Frankie and I collaborated at this point in my life when I really want practical swimwear,' stated Anderson, referring to her co-collaborator Francesca Aiello, the founder of Frankies Bikinis. In what felt like a jab at the more performative days of 'Baywatch' beauty shots, the actor emphasized that her own designs were centered on the realities of women, 'not just taking pictures on the beach.' It was an important note to include, said Butchart, adding that she 'wouldn't have felt comfortable' featuring the red swimsuit at any other time in Anderson's life. In light of the star's powerful rebrand, however, it felt right. 'That's why we've got this quote from her as well,' Butchart said. 'Because we really wanted to give (Anderson) her own voice.'
CNN
28-03-2025
- Entertainment
- CNN
Pamela Anderson, ‘explosive' bikinis and the changing tides of swimwear style
High-cut, fire truck red and with a scoop neckline that seemed designed for slow-motion cameras, Pamela Anderson's 'Baywatch' swimsuit — worn by the actor during her tenure on the US TV series from 1992 to 1997 — is one of the most infamous on-screen uniforms of that decade. Now, the storied swimming costume is on display at 'Splash! A Century of Swimming and Style' — a new exhibition at The Design Museum in London, running until August 17 — where it is suspended in a glass case on an invisible mannequin, albeit with erect nipples. It's the crown jewel of the exhibition, which maps the changing tastes and fashion of swimwear through the ages. 'This kind of thing haunted me,' said curator and fashion historian Amber Butchart, nodding at Anderson's red swimsuit, which, she noted, was one of the costliest pieces to insure. 'It was very much part of that '90s culture (which said) 'This is how you're supposed to look,'' Butchart told CNN ahead of the opening, citing the pervasive male gaze that dictated the public perception of female celebrities. 'I think (Anderson has) done such a great job of turning that around and reclaiming her own image.' Anderson began her acting career on 'Baywatch' as C. J. Parker — a lifeguard, volleyball coach and beach café owner from California — who was rarely seen in little more than a tiny red one-piece, with an orange life raft tucked under her arm. Anderson has since worked hard to diversify her public image: writing a plant-based cookbook, going proudly make-up-free on the red carpet and making her arthouse debut with a leading role in Gia Coppola's 2025 indie film 'The Last Showgirl'. But many will remember Anderson most for her role on 'Baywatch', of which she is widely credited with making the most watched TV show in the world, with over 1 billion viewers from more than 140 countries tuning in each week at its height. Many international broadcasters would only buy episodes that Anderson featured in, a condition that was nicknamed 'Pamela Clauses,' according to her memoir. In 2019, to honour the TV series' 30th anniversary, Pantone created a shade called 'Baywatch red.' All the bathing suits worn in 'Baywatch' were custom-made for each actor by the Californian sportswear brand TYR. 'They could highlight whatever they wanted to highlight,' said Butchart, referring to the actors' physiques. So when it came to exhibiting the clothes, a traditional showcase display wouldn't cut it. 'We didn't really want to put it on a mannequin, unless it was the exact proportions of Pamela Anderson,' she told CNN. Instead, the red one-piece hangs in the air — an object in its own right, divorced from the body that brought it fame. Beginning with the cumbersome knitted unitards of the 1920s, visitors of the exhibition are taken on a whistle-stop tour past the first modern bikini in 1946 (morbidly named after the nuclear testing site, Bikini Atoll, because of the two-piece's 'explosive' effect), onto the advent of Speedos and landing at the scuba crepe-turned-couture designs of luxury fashion house Viktor & Rolf. But the showcase is more than just a story of shifting silhouettes; Butchart also chronicles the social power of swimwear. Encased in a Perspex display cabinet is a grim, municipal-looking rental bathing suit over a century old. Emblazoned with the words 'Margate Corporation,' it was among the costumes once offered by the English local council to those who didn't have the means to buy their own. In recent years, brands have sought to make swimming more inclusive through design innovation. A Victoriana blue and white striped gender-neutral suit from Beefcake Swimwear, for example, caters to transgender bodies from XS to XL, while a tri-colored one-shoulder suit from Girls Chronically Rock features special fasteners making it easier for those with disabilities to get dressed. 'Swimwear enables access to public spaces,' explained Butchart. 'So, if you don't have swimwear that works for your body, you are denied that experience.' The exhibition also addresses the pressures that come with going for a dip. Tucked away in one corner of the show are reminders of the oppressive beauty standards pushed by fashion magazines and corporations as soon as swimwear got skimpier. In one 1925 advert for Zip Depilatory cream, copywriters promise freedom from 'unwanted hair' and skin that is 'soft and smooth, really adorable.' A Vogue magazine article a few years later dictated that 'she who decides to discard stockings must also decide to keep her legs absolutely free from hair at all times.' Over the next few decades, swimwear cuts would only get higher and higher. What makes Anderson's 'Baywatch' suit so memorable, Butchart said, was its higher-cut leg — a staple of '80s and '90s swimwear designs — and its one-piece design, a style that has experienced a resurgence in popularity. 'Things had become so bikini-dominated,' she said. 'Then, suddenly, it was fashionable to have a one-piece swimsuit again.' This, plus 'the magic of Pamela,' Butchart added, referring to the star's enduring 'it' factor. On the placard beneath the hallowed swimming costume reads a quote from Anderson on her own swimwear line, designed over 30 years later. 'I think it's great that Frankie and I collaborated at this point in my life when I really want practical swimwear,' stated Anderson, referring to her co-collaborator Francesca Aiello, the founder of Frankies Bikinis. In what felt like a jab at the more performative days of 'Baywatch' beauty shots, the actor emphasized that her own designs were centered on the realities of women, 'not just taking pictures on the beach.' It was an important note to include, said Butchart, adding that she 'wouldn't have felt comfortable' featuring the red swimsuit at any other time in Anderson's life. In light of the star's powerful rebrand, however, it felt right. 'That's why we've got this quote from her as well,' Butchart said. 'Because we really wanted to give (Anderson) her own voice.'
CNN
28-03-2025
- Entertainment
- CNN
Pamela Anderson, ‘explosive' bikinis and the changing tides of swimwear style
High-cut, fire truck red and with a scoop neckline that seemed designed for slow-motion cameras, Pamela Anderson's 'Baywatch' swimsuit — worn by the actor during her tenure on the US TV series from 1992 to 1997 — is one of the most infamous on-screen uniforms of that decade. Now, the storied swimming costume is on display at 'Splash! A Century of Swimming and Style' — a new exhibition at The Design Museum in London, running until August 17 — where it is suspended in a glass case on an invisible mannequin, albeit with erect nipples. It's the crown jewel of the exhibition, which maps the changing tastes and fashion of swimwear through the ages. 'This kind of thing haunted me,' said curator and fashion historian Amber Butchart, nodding at Anderson's red swimsuit, which, she noted, was one of the costliest pieces to insure. 'It was very much part of that '90s culture (which said) 'This is how you're supposed to look,'' Butchart told CNN ahead of the opening, citing the pervasive male gaze that dictated the public perception of female celebrities. 'I think (Anderson has) done such a great job of turning that around and reclaiming her own image.' Anderson began her acting career on 'Baywatch' as C. J. Parker — a lifeguard, volleyball coach and beach café owner from California — who was rarely seen in little more than a tiny red one-piece, with an orange life raft tucked under her arm. Anderson has since worked hard to diversify her public image: writing a plant-based cookbook, going proudly make-up-free on the red carpet and making her arthouse debut with a leading role in Gia Coppola's 2025 indie film 'The Last Showgirl'. But many will remember Anderson most for her role on 'Baywatch', of which she is widely credited with making the most watched TV show in the world, with over 1 billion viewers from more than 140 countries tuning in each week at its height. Many international broadcasters would only buy episodes that Anderson featured in, a condition that was nicknamed 'Pamela Clauses,' according to her memoir. In 2019, to honour the TV series' 30th anniversary, Pantone created a shade called 'Baywatch red.' All the bathing suits worn in 'Baywatch' were custom-made for each actor by the Californian sportswear brand TYR. 'They could highlight whatever they wanted to highlight,' said Butchart, referring to the actors' physiques. So when it came to exhibiting the clothes, a traditional showcase display wouldn't cut it. 'We didn't really want to put it on a mannequin, unless it was the exact proportions of Pamela Anderson,' she told CNN. Instead, the red one-piece hangs in the air — an object in its own right, divorced from the body that brought it fame. Beginning with the cumbersome knitted unitards of the 1920s, visitors of the exhibition are taken on a whistle-stop tour past the first modern bikini in 1946 (morbidly named after the nuclear testing site, Bikini Atoll, because of the two-piece's 'explosive' effect), onto the advent of Speedos and landing at the scuba crepe-turned-couture designs of luxury fashion house Viktor & Rolf. But the showcase is more than just a story of shifting silhouettes; Butchart also chronicles the social power of swimwear. Encased in a Perspex display cabinet is a grim, municipal-looking rental bathing suit over a century old. Emblazoned with the words 'Margate Corporation,' it was among the costumes once offered by the English local council to those who didn't have the means to buy their own. In recent years, brands have sought to make swimming more inclusive through design innovation. A Victoriana blue and white striped gender-neutral suit from Beefcake Swimwear, for example, caters to transgender bodies from XS to XL, while a tri-colored one-shoulder suit from Girls Chronically Rock features special fasteners making it easier for those with disabilities to get dressed. 'Swimwear enables access to public spaces,' explained Butchart. 'So, if you don't have swimwear that works for your body, you are denied that experience.' The exhibition also addresses the pressures that come with going for a dip. Tucked away in one corner of the show are reminders of the oppressive beauty standards pushed by fashion magazines and corporations as soon as swimwear got skimpier. In one 1925 advert for Zip Depilatory cream, copywriters promise freedom from 'unwanted hair' and skin that is 'soft and smooth, really adorable.' A Vogue magazine article a few years later dictated that 'she who decides to discard stockings must also decide to keep her legs absolutely free from hair at all times.' Over the next few decades, swimwear cuts would only get higher and higher. What makes Anderson's 'Baywatch' suit so memorable, Butchart said, was its higher-cut leg — a staple of '80s and '90s swimwear designs — and its one-piece design, a style that has experienced a resurgence in popularity. 'Things had become so bikini-dominated,' she said. 'Then, suddenly, it was fashionable to have a one-piece swimsuit again.' This, plus 'the magic of Pamela,' Butchart added, referring to the star's enduring 'it' factor. On the placard beneath the hallowed swimming costume reads a quote from Anderson on her own swimwear line, designed over 30 years later. 'I think it's great that Frankie and I collaborated at this point in my life when I really want practical swimwear,' stated Anderson, referring to her co-collaborator Francesca Aiello, the founder of Frankies Bikinis. In what felt like a jab at the more performative days of 'Baywatch' beauty shots, the actor emphasized that her own designs were centered on the realities of women, 'not just taking pictures on the beach.' It was an important note to include, said Butchart, adding that she 'wouldn't have felt comfortable' featuring the red swimsuit at any other time in Anderson's life. In light of the star's powerful rebrand, however, it felt right. 'That's why we've got this quote from her as well,' Butchart said. 'Because we really wanted to give (Anderson) her own voice.'
Telegraph
27-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
Splash! A Century of Swimming and Style: From Pamela Anderson's famous one-piece to Tom Daley's tiny Speedos
The star exhibit of the Design Museum 's new show Splash! A Century of Swimming and Style is Pamela Anderson 's iconic flaming-red swimsuit from her Baywatch days. But bereft of her big bouncing bosoms, this tiny lycra number, suspended from two wires behind a glass case in the basement of the museum, feels a bit deflated. The only bits of the display faithful to the original are two prosthetic and very pert nipples nestled within the folds of the fabric and seemingly in the wrong place by about an inch. Splash! A Century of Swimming and Style intends to celebrate 'our enduring love of the water over the last 100 years' by showcasing swimming's evolution in its social, cultural, technological and environmental contexts. The exhibition is divided thematically, with each of the three main spaces of the museum's basement dedicated to one of the three major swimming arenas: pools, lidos, and nature. While the carefully thought-out 1950s retro pop ambience initially comes across as vibrant, an imminent sensation of drowning takes hold as one dives deeper into this subterranean hoarder's paradise of any and all swimming-related paraphernalia. At best it is a 'fun' exhibition (not necessarily a bad thing) which ping-pongs the viewer's attention between an abundance of trinkets, advertisements, magazines, posters, goggles, rubber pool slides, costume sketches, swimming pool designs and rather unsightly swimming costumes covering the expanse of modern swimming history. As with all decent British museums these days, a sociopolitical angle has not been neglected, even for this seemingly benign activity. Playing on a loop in the first room is a video about The Subversive Sirens, who define themselves as 'a Minnesota-based synchronised swimming team committed to black liberation, equity in swimming/aquatic arts, radical body acceptance, and queer visibility' and won a joint gold medal for their free combo routine at the Gay Games in 2018. The video of their practice includes members of the team talking about what they enjoy about synchronised swimming: 'Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare. We're not gonna wait for the world to be, like this perfect 'da da da da da' to start living free now.' While there are some engaging artefacts in this first room – the first Olympic solo swimming gold medal won by a British woman, Lucy Morton at the Paris Olympics in 1924; the microscopic Speedos worn by Tom Daley at the Tokyo Olympics, where he won gold in 2021 – it was quite difficult to concentrate over the omnipresent sound of the liberation of swimming being played in a running loop. 'One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight' go The Subversive Sirens as they practice their neverending underwater routine. How tiring it must be for them to be trapped underwater in the basement of the Design Museum in perpetuity. The Splash! A Century of Swimming and Style exhibition is certainly a spectacle and will be especially worthwhile for those who are swimming enthusiasts, nostalgic for the lido age, or curious about the sociopolitical importance of swimming since the 1920s. Come for the refreshing aquatic levity and stay for the Facekini, Monokini (topless bikini), and a silver swimming thong; if this is the way modern swimming is headed, then let's bring back the bathing machines, none of which are on display. This is a good opportunity for viewers to dip their toes into the nourishing waters of swimming sub-culture; without any risk of verrucas.
