The Victorians may have invented the mass seaside holiday, but it took a while for the idea of “stripping off” to become popular.
The masses may have launched themselves into the waters around what would become the seaside towns of Britain, but for the middle and upper classes the idea of stripping off into your bathing suit on the beach was simply unheard of.
This was a time before beach huts were invented, so the enterprising folks around the seaside resorts created the bathing machine. Essentially this was a horse drawn cart (generally) without the horse which would firstly be used as a changing room, and then often driven down to the water.
For the more adventurous they would then alight into the waters although early on the bathers would stay under canvas and simply sit dangling their legs into the seawater.
This carried on right into the 1900s when attitudes were changing slightly and becoming more relaxed, thus allowing the beach hut to be invented and people to take tea by the beach, and other pursuits. Of course today what used to be rented by the day has become a seriously expensive residence, with some beach huts costing more than a house!
In this tradition, the Telegraph have serialised the book Beach Huts and Bathing Machines
