Weekly Wrap: May 1
This week on Planet Nude: Mandy Zelinka remembered, Ohio's body-freedom fight heats up, and World Naked Gardening Day
Welcome to another Weekly Wrap. Today is World Naked Gardening Day! Hope you all can find some time to get out there and get dirty, but right here is where we can get into the weeds. This week we remember Mandy Zelinka, co-founder of Skinny Dippers Club, who died tragically at 49. In the legislative world, Ohio’s latest body-freedom threat has moved from committee to the Senate floor, and proposed “improvements” to Mākena State Park could quietly tighten access to Little Beach in Maui. On the history front, we also trace a century-old German gymnastic wheel that ended up at America’s oldest nudist club, and a French body painter writes about his body painting practice. Plus, as always, comics!
Dip a toe or dive in. Either way, ahoy! 🚀
This week on Planet Nude 🪐
A proposed renovation of Mākena State Park has advocates worried about Little Beach, Maui's clothing-optional cove. The DLNR's improvements plan would consolidate parking and access points, which opponents say lays the groundwork for reservation-based entry, the kind of managed model that quietly ends informal spaces without ever banning them outright. A public hearing is May 12.
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Ohio's House Bill 249, the Indecent Exposure Modernization Act, passed the House in March by a 63-32 vote and now sits in the Senate Judiciary Committee, where it poses a concrete threat to body freedom advocates and naturists. The bill replaces the undefined term "private parts" with "private area," which explicitly includes the female breast below the areola, making toplessness a codified offense rather than a matter of legal ambiguity. Naturist clubs receive no exemption, and AANR has confirmed it is preparing to weigh in with the Senate Judiciary Committee directly before the legislative window closes.
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For the first time in recent memory, AANR is giving its national convention an actual theme. The 95th edition runs August 11–16 at The Willamettans in Springfield, Oregon, under the banner of "Steampunk: Past, Present & Future." Six days of programming include a steampunk parade, golf cart jousting, live music, and a fundraiser auction, the kind of spectacle that signals the organization is trying to make its flagship event feel like something worth attending again after years of post-pandemic drift.
A heartfelt remembrance honors Mandy Zelinka and the impact she had on those around her. The story reflects on her presence, contributions, and the connections she built, offering readers a chance to recognize how one person’s energy and commitment can leave a lasting mark on the naturist community.
French body painter Alexis Szwed has spent the past year traveling naturist centers across France, painting abstract marker designs on willing participants through a project called Symbiose. The work is radically inclusive, open to all ages and body types, though even in naturist spaces, self-consciousness keeps many older participants on the sidelines, a tension the project quietly challenges with every session.
Brett Marcella's seventh installment of short film picks leans heavily into art and surrealism, offering five free films that range from a tender French body-acceptance comedy to a 1976 BBC documentary on painter Euan Uglow's painstakingly slow studio practice. The standout curiosity is a 2017 beach short co-directed by Planet Nude's own Evan Nicks, made years before he got into nudism himself.
On the grounds of Sky Farm, the oldest continuously operating nudist club in America, there sits a large steel wheel that most visitors walk past without recognizing. It is a Rhönrad, a century-old German gymnastic apparatus with deep roots in the FKK movement. Invented by Otto Feick in the 1920s and later performed at FKK gatherings and INF congresses across Europe, the wheel traveled west alongside the German immigrants who founded American nudism, carrying with it a tradition of physical culture the naturist movement has largely forgotten.
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Recent posts from 1 Naturist Life
Stoicism and naturism share more philosophical ground than most people realize: both treat the body as morally neutral, both view clothing as social performance, and both ask practitioners to examine inherited assumptions rather than simply accept them. The parallel has its limits, but as a framework for defending naturism on philosophical grounds, Marcus Aurelius turns out to be surprisingly useful company.
That’s a wrap
That officially wraps up this week! Join us next Saturday for more insights and stories from the week ahead. 🪐