<
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2026/jan/13/professional-mermaids-ocean-ambassadors>
"Propelled by a shimmering silicon tail, Katrin Gray spins underwater, blowing
kisses to the audience as her long, copper hair floats around her face. Her
seemingly effortless movement is anything but – a professional mermaid’s free
diving and performance skills require training, practice and total
concentration.
Mermaiding has become a global cottage industry, with pageants, conventions,
retreats and meet-ups, where people gather in “pods” to practise their dolphin
kicks. Makers create bespoke tail flukes, bejewelled bras, mermaid hair and
even prosthetic gills for professional and hobbyist “seasters”. There is even a
Netflix reality series called
MerPeople, which documents the occasionally
perilous journey of several aspiring professional merfolk. “No dead mermaids”
is the motto of one business featured.
Gray, who goes by Mermaid Kat, is an industry veteran. While working as a scuba
diving instructor in Phuket, a childhood obsession with Disney’s
Little
Mermaid led to her asking a wetsuit maker to fashion a cover for her monofin.
“Phuket is quite a small island and it didn’t take too long for people to
notice a crazy girl swimming around in a mermaid tail,” she says. People asked
her to perform at birthday parties and public events, and soon after she was
working as a mermaid full-time. “It just took off.”
In 2012, Gray founded the world’s first mermaid school. Since then, more than
12,000 students have attended her classes and workshops in Germany, Thailand
and Australia."
Share and enjoy,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
