A three-foot-long elasticated tail doesn’t sound like the most practical – or flattering – of fashion accessories.
But that hasn’t stopped mermaid tails making waves as a rather unlikely trend.
The swimsuits are proving popular thanks to their shimmering, colourful designs and the fact they can help tone stomach muscles and improve fitness.
A string of celebrities have sported mermaid tails including Britney Spears, Myleene Klass, model Poppy Delevingne and most recently ex-Spice Girl Geri Halliwell, who this week shared a video on Instagram of herself wearing a pink number while doing laps of a pool.
And it seems they’re a hit outside celebrity circles, too. British company Planet Mermaid – which sells a range of mermaid accessories and designed Miss Halliwell’s tail – said sales have soared by 65 per cent in the last year.
Myleene Klass has adopted the fishtail trend which is said to allow a swimmer to kick more powerfully
‘Mermaid schools’ have also been springing up in the UK for children, to help them become stronger swimmers, while mermaid experiences are on offer for youngsters and adults alike .
The movement of ‘mermaiding’ – kicking with your legs together, also known as a dolphin kick – uses more core muscles than kicking your legs separately.
It is also more powerful than regular kicking and freedivers, who don’t use breathing equipment, have long used mono-fins, which look like mermaid tails, to be able to swim deeper with each breath.
Splash! Model Poppy Delevingne (left) is seen here enjoying her mermaid tail in the sun like a true siren, while Britney Spears relaxed by the pool with her son (left) in her blue mermaid tail
Planet Mermaid founder Magdalena Jovanovic came up with her business idea to raise money after her son was diagnosed with autism.
She said: ‘I found a gap in the market with mermaid tails and used my skillset as a costume designer to develop a collection that captures the mermaid movement.
‘It’s one of those things that until you’re in a tail, you just don’t get it. But celebrities love them because of the instant transformation from human form to one-legged which offers a vulnerable out-of-water state but a powerful, magical in-water one.
‘There is also an undeniable fun quality; a mermaid kick is twice as fast as a human one.’
With prices starting at £70, she has a new collection for adults set to be released this year.
In keeping with the growing trend, the 1984 Oscar-nominated film Splash – in which Tom Hanks played a man who falls in love with a mermaid, played by Daryl Hannah – is being remade, starring heart-throb actor Channing Tatum.
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At 43 I finally got to live out my childhood fantasy…and it went just swimmingly, SADIE NICHOLAS discovers
Shaking back my blonde hair, I shimmy to the water’s edge and, with one deft flick of my long pink tail, I glide into the cool blue lagoon below.
I am Ariel from The Little Mermaid – at least for as long as I can hold my breath, anyway.
For, at the age of 43, I can indulge my childhood fantasy and become a mermaid for the day.
Bonkers? Oh yes, entirely, but I am not unusual in my secret proclivity. A generation of women like me has grown up enthralled by mermaids – their beauty, grace and irresistible, feminine allure.
Now, a whole industry has grown out of our fascination. Professional mermaid instructors Lisa Bousted, 44, and daughter Megan, 18, are two of a handful in the UK giving little girls and grown women the chance to grow a tail for the day.
Little Mermaid: Sadie Nicholas realised a lifelong dream when she became a mermaid
Lisa, who is based in Barnstaple, north Devon, runs Mermaids UK, offering everything from taster sessions to hen parties.
But emulating Ariel is not for the faint-hearted. Professional mermaids are incredible athletes. They boast stomach muscles like rocks and many can hold their breath for over four minutes. I reckon I will manage four seconds before the urge to gulp air consumes me. But first, one has to look the part. I sit on the pool-side where Megan helps me clip my feet into a mono-fin. Then I pull my pink Lycra tail fabric over it and up my legs.
I feel a momentary sense of panic. Realisation dawns that I can no longer walk and just balancing in the pool will be challenging, let alone performing any mermaid trickery. Lisa takes me through some breathing exercises that she promises will help me spend at least five seconds under water.
Sadie Nicholas becomes a mermaid for the day and said that it went smimmingly
First, I have to learn to float on my back, holding on to the side with one hand. Dead easy in a bikini on holiday, but with my fin heavy in the water and no legs to kick, I roll on to one side and panic when I can’t right myself. On the fourth attempt I get the hang of it. And it is one hell of a workout.
Then the real test: undulating like a mermaid on my back across the pool. I feel like the uncoordinated fool at the back of an aerobics class, spluttering and flailing with arms and tail moving in the wrong directions.
Pupils at Lisa’s MerKingdom are taught other skills including 360-degree turns and even ‘dance’ routines.
I feel these are beyond me, but any mermaid worth her scales has to venture beneath the surface.
So, we practise the breathing exercises again and under I go. I forget to count to five as Lisa had taught me, so desperate am I to get above water again.
But finally I manage it! And what’s more, I do it again at least another 20 times (all in the name of trying to get a decent photo). With each ‘dive’ I feel less frightened and I even manage to open my eyes under water.
I’m no Ariel and in the end we concede that the photographer will have to settle for capturing me as a grimacing rather than graceful sea creature. But it’s actually been an uplifting experience in which I’ve started conquering a fear.
Being a mermaid is pure escapism, a chance to dip my fin back into the magic and wonder of childhood. It’s easy to see why so many grown women are clamouring to try it.