The Orbit: July 11
This week on Planet Nude: A father's legacy, Koversada's origin story and today's Skinny Dip Day finale!
This week on Planet Nude
Bryan Nix never called himself a nudist and this week’s tribute essay is careful not to claim otherwise on his behalf. What comes through instead is something more useful than a label: a habit of questioning norms without using that questioning as an excuse to be dishonest, of working inside institutions rather than torching them. It’s a personal piece, but it lands on the same instinct that runs through the rest of the week’s coverage, that the interesting story about naturism is rarely the nudity itself. It’s what people build around it, or fight to protect, or quietly inherit.
That instinct shows up again in our latest Waypoints: Koversada, which shared the story of how a swimming instructor from Munich talked a communist tourism board into building one of Europe’s first commercial naturist resorts, over the Church’s objections, on the strength of a signed contract. It’s a reminder that naturist spaces have always depended on somebody working the system rather than standing outside it, whether that system is a Yugoslav tourism ministry in 1960 or a Substack newsletter today.
Our interview with animator William Bradford covers similar ground from an entirely different angle. His short film about Vancouver’s World Naked Bike Ride spent two years on the festival circuit. The film is a playful look at the famous bike ride without making the riders the punchline. Rather, it’s a small case study in how naturism gets framed by outsiders, and Bradford’s insistence on keeping the humor pointed at the “thumpers” rather than the cyclists says something about what responsible coverage of this subject can look like—animated or otherwise.
Meanwhile in Mexico City, Día al Desnudo drew more than a thousand participants this year—sans bicycle—its largest turnout yet, moving from a Guadalajara body-acceptance initiative in 2022 into a genuine annual fixture with yoga sessions, a nude café, and a peaceful march past a national landmark. It’s the kind of institutional growth that’s easy to miss if you’re only watching the beaches and legal fights. But we’ve been covering it on Planet Nude since the beginning.
The rest of our editorial week belonged to Skinny Dip Day, which was celebrated around the world today. Team Planet Nude came in $243 short of first place last year and has spent this week chasing the top spot again, with a Vegas-area pool party hosted by Planet Nude along with the Las Vegas Bares, plus a Southern California club fielding its first-ever team behind the promise of a pie to the face. Not the kind of dip we usually go for, but whatever it takes to raise funds for women in need.
How was your Skinny Dip Day? Did you join a team or dip solo? If you haven’t donated to support the Fistula Foundation yet, it’s not too late!
Check out these stories and more from this week on Planet Nude.
Recent posts in Culture
This week on Strips
Diary of the Astro-Nudes
More recent Strips
News of the Nude
Scottish nudists planning naked summer boat trip to Outlander castle on Firth of Forth.
British Naturism’s Scottish contingent has a packed August ahead, headlined by a naked sail up the Firth of Forth past the castle that stood in for Outlander’s Fort William. It’s a small but telling data point on how deep pop-culture tie-ins have worked their way into naturist event planning as a recruitment tool.
Naturists urging members to strip off and practice their swings at crazy golf course.
The same British Naturism calendar includes a nude evening at a Florida-style indoor crazy golf course near Edinburgh later that same August weekend as the Forth boat trip. Taken together with the sailing story, it’s a snapshot of a national naturist body leaning hard into novelty, low-stakes public events as an on-ramp for newcomers rather than the beach-and-resort model most outsiders still picture.
Extreme heat drives residents to Arizona nudist community pool.
Shangri-La, a family-owned nudist park in New River, Arizona established in 1959, is fielding a five-year waitlist for full-time residency as triple-digit heat pushes locals toward clothing-optional pool life. The timing, landing right alongside International Skinny Dip Day, is a useful reminder that plenty of people arrive at naturism through comfort and practicality long before they arrive at it through philosophy.
Discord Dispatch
The Discord settled into a summer rhythm this week. Members checked in from naked hikes, bike rides, and club events, while new faces continued to join the conversation and plan summer meetups.
Join us at discord.gg/8gt7D6ssMd — or click here to learn more.
Featured: 1 Naturist Life
A wildfire destroyed a hidden, unmarked forest clearing that had been Dustin’s private nude forest-bathing spot for years and this piece sits with that grief honestly rather than brushing it off as "just trees." He traces the loss through stages, guilty relief, anger, then an unexpected ache over small details like afternoon light and grounds his hope in fire ecology, noting that burned forests typically regenerate through pioneer species rather than staying dead. He's not returning while the area is closed, but has marked a date years out to watch the regrowth firsthand.
The Orbit is Planet Nude’s weekly digest. Published every Saturday. 🪐