Meet the merpeople: ‘Once I put the tail on, my life was changed forever’ | Swimming

P.Wrapped by a shimmering silicone 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: the freediving and performance skills of a professional mermaid require training, practice and complete concentration.

The use of mermaids has become a global cottage industry, with competitions, conventions, retreats and meet-ups, where people gather in “pods” to practice their dolphin kicks. Manufacturers create custom tail flukes, bejeweled bras, mermaid hair, and even prosthetic gills for professional and amateur “seasters.” There is even a Netflix reality series called MerPeople, which documents the sometimes perilous journey of several budding professional merfolk. “No dead sirens” is the motto of one company 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 The Little Mermaid led her to ask a wetsuit maker to make a cover for her monofin.

“Phuket is a pretty small island and it didn’t take long for people to notice a crazy girl swimming 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 full-time mermaid. “It just took off.”

In 2012, Gray founded the world’s first mermaid school. Since then, more than 12,000 students have taken his courses and workshops in Germany, Thailand and Australia.

In addition to learning how to dive underwater with your legs attached – using a wave-like motion similar to a butterfly kick – Gray’s beginner lessons cover safety, surface swimming and the importance of being an “ocean ambassador.” His multi-day international retreats, aimed at full-time aspiring artists, sell out months in advance.

Melbourne-based Tara Schwarz, known as Mermaid Tarielle, also “made a career out of swimming with sparkly tails”. Last year, she attended a mermaid convention in Germany, where she held workshops on underwater makeup.

“It’s a skill in itself to achieve full makeup that not only stays in place in the water, but also pops out,” she says.

There are occupational hazards behind magic. Keeping your eyes open underwater means blurred vision; sinus and ear infections are common; hypothermia and seasickness are a possibility and, once you’re done, getting out of the skin-tight silicon is a struggle.

Gray and Schwarz have had their share of extreme water adventures. Gray starred alongside a curious hammerhead shark in an anti-shark finning campaign video in the Bahamas and remembers feeling distinctly overwhelmed when a 13-foot-long American crocodile swam above him in Mexico.

“To do this kind of work, you have to train regularly and work on your lung capacity,” says Schwarz. A calm state of mind and a low heart rate determine “how much power you have to put into the movement and how long you can stay underwater.”

Mermaid shows are an opportunity to share messages about ocean conservation. At birthday parties, Schwarz, who has training as a children’s entertainer, will play a game similar to passing the parcel, “where I tell them how I collected all these treasures from the ocean, but I also found all this trash,” she says.

“We agree, it’s a shame I had to spend all my time cleaning up the trash before I could get the treasure.”

Ocean conservation is also the main game of Perth-based Mongplearn Uttama, aka Mermeow Awn. “I started out doing corporate events… but I really prefer to be involved in events that help the community,” she says. “I love cleaning beaches and seabeds as a volunteer mermaid.

“We use the power of mermaid lure to get people to come help us pick up trash. It seems to work. When they know the mermaids will be there, they come.”

The mermaids were a lifeline for Uttama. “I lost someone very important to me and I was suffering from depression,” she says. But when she dove into a pool for the first time, she felt free.

“I didn’t cry in the water. It’s so calm and it shuts down the senses. I didn’t think about anything…I just let my tears go. Once I put on the mermaid tail, my life changed forever.”

Stories like Uttama’s are common among merfolk. “People who want to be mermaids and mermen are people who want to invite more color and fantasy into their lives, and there’s often a reason for that,” says Gray.

Like any community, it has its share of behind-the-scenes drama and gossip, which is why, as a mermaid mentor, she emphasizes the importance of finding the right group. And when it comes to more spectacular stunts, Gray and Schwarz say a competent security team is also essential.

“If something goes wrong, they can come in with air, no matter where I am or what’s going on,” Schwarz says. “When I do a deeper dive, I always have people… who understand the technical side of freediving, to be able to offer the right kind of support.”

“If it was always easy, I wouldn’t find it fun anymore,” Schwarz says. “There’s a part of me – the free diver – that likes to push yourself. The beauty of mermaiding is that you can do it and still look beautiful and graceful.”