Hangloose launches adults-only open-water swims at Bluewater quarry lake

Hangloose Adventure Bluewater has turned its chalk quarry lake into a stripped-back, adults-only swim night, with the debut of Nothing but Water drawing almost 20 swimmers to the evening session in Greenhithe. The format is being pitched as a relaxed, judgement-free wellbeing experience rather than a stunt, and the next run is already scheduled for June 17, 2026, with tickets at £15.

Swimmers at the Bluewater site, which sits at Bluewater Shopping Centre on Bluewater Parkway, could choose 150-metre or 250-metre routes through the lake. One attendee said the experience felt laidback and completely natural despite the nudity element, which is exactly the kind of reaction Hangloose appears to be chasing. Managing director Brian Phelps said the quarry lake is a striking setting close to the shopping centre and said the monthly evening swims are meant to help people “strip away the distractions of modern life” and restore calm.

That positioning matters in a market where open-water swimming has moved well beyond a niche endurance habit. Swim England says regular participation in open-water swimming in England has more than doubled, from around 266,000 adults in 2016-17 to 543,000 in 2023-24, while more than four million adults now swim in lakes, rivers and the sea each year. Hangloose is leaning into that growth with a wider Bluewater offer that already includes guided floating sound-bath sessions and sauna use, and Bluewater’s own site markets the cold-water swim as open year-round with health benefits such as improved circulation and stress reduction.

The adults-only format also places Nothing but Water in a broader British naturist and body-confidence scene that has been building for years. Great British Skinny Dip says thousands of people take part in clothes-free swims across the UK, and Outdoor Swimmer says the campaign began in 2016. British Naturism has also said an Ipsos poll commissioned in 2022 found almost seven million Britons describe themselves as naturists or nudists. Taken together, those numbers suggest Hangloose is not inventing a new audience so much as packaging an existing one for the cold-water market.

That makes Bluewater more than a curiosity. Between the ticketing, the adults-only framing and the controlled quarry-lake setting, Hangloose is testing a version of open-water swimming built around privacy, consent and body confidence as much as cold exposure. In a crowded wellness market, the appeal is not just being in the water, but being in it with the distractions stripped away.