It keeps baffling us how many naturists we know around the world. Every time when we scroll through our phones, we see all these foreign numbers popping up, from places where we have ended up one day or another. We can roughly divide them in two categories: Airbnbs and naturists.
Airbnbs because this is where we spend many of our nights and it’s always a good idea to be able to communicate with the hosts. And naturists, because it’s such a friendly and well-connected network that often forms the foundation of our planning.
This may come as a surprise and we’re well aware that we are in a privileged position. From the many questions we get about how and where to make naturists friends, we realise that not all naturists have found their way into “the network”. So here are some tips.
Clubs and associations
Naturist clubs are by far the best place to meet other naturists because they focus a lot on the social aspect. Their goal is to bring naturists together in a space where there is no judgement and where it’s perfectly normal to be naked. We divide clubs into three main categories:
Landed clubs: This is the most common type in Europe. Landed clubs have their own private property that often has some facilities like a pool, sauna, jacuzzi, etc. Often they also have options to stay overnight like camping pitches or chalets. Everything that’s being organised by the club happens at this property.
Non-landed clubs: These are the clubs that don’t have their own property, so when they organise events, they do this at naturists resorts, or at the home of one of the members, or they just rent out textile resorts and make them naturist for a weekend or a week. Not having their own place asks for much more organisation, but it has the advantage that almost everything is possible. If you can get enough people together, you can rent out a large hotel or a waterpark for example. The latter actually happens in Belgium and the UK, and probably in other countries as well.
Beach clubs: These lay in between landed and non-landed clubs. They don’t have their own private property, but they’re centred around a certain nude beach and that’s also where most of the gatherings will happen.
Small resorts
The other place to find a lot of naturist friends you just haven’t met yet are naturist resorts. These are often commercial businesses that create spaces and facilities for naturists. Not too long ago, these were mostly campsites, but today you can find everything from a small camp in the woods to real naturist villages or top-notch all-inclusive naturist hotels. Or even nude cruises.
If you want to get to know other naturists, you might think that the places with the most guests will give you the most chances of meeting someone you like. But it’s actually the other way around. One golden rule is that the larger the resort, the more anonymous it becomes. We’re not saying that it’s impossible to make friends at the very large resorts, but the smaller resorts just often have a much more social atmosphere.
Nude beaches
This is a tricky one because it really depends from beach to beach. In our experience, most people who visit nude beaches don’t do so to make friends. They want to relax, sunbathe, read a book, and maybe just get away from the social scene.
Another disadvantage of a nude beach is that there’s no access control, which means that it’s accessible to anyone. Even to those with less naturist-minded intentions. Visitors of nude beaches know this, which sometimes makes them a bit worried when a total stranger strikes up a conversation. For all they know, you just came closer to have a good look or you’re about to make them an indecent proposal.
Nevertheless, we’ve also been to nude beaches with a very social atmosphere where visitors introduce themselves to others and end up all hanging out together. It really depends. In any case, we would recommend that you first check if there isn’t a local beach association that you can join. This means that you’ll already know some people from the moment you arrive, and being a member will also give you more credibility.
The Internet
We always recommend the internet as the last place to look, because it can get pretty weird on there and because it’s always more fun to meet people in real life. But sometimes you don’t have that option. Maybe your partner doesn’t allow you to visit naturist places, maybe you live in a country where naturism is illegal, or maybe you’re just too far away from any resort, club, or nude beach.
The places we recommend you definitely not to look are “naturist friend finders”. We know, it sounds like the perfect place to find naturist friends, but it’s too good to be true. In our experience, pretty much every website that tells you that they’ll find naturist friends for you is a total scam. They’re after your personal details and/or your money.
If you’re looking for a naturist partner, dating sites are not a bad idea. We’ve actually met naturist couples who found each other on Tinder. But here too, go for the generally recognised websites and not for so-called naturist dating sites.
Social media
The best place on the internet to get in touch with other naturists is social media. Facebook has numerous naturist groups, Twitter has a strong naturist community, and smaller sites like MeWe also tend to attract genuine naturists. But, of course, also non-genuine naturists. And that’s the downside of online naturism. There are a couple of easy tricks to filter out most of the rotten apples though:
✋ If their profile is full of porn, that’s an obvious big no.
✋ If they send you dick pics or any other close-ups of genitals, it’s wrong.
✋ If they ask for nude pictures of you, that’s a big alarm bell too.
✋ If they look like models, they’re probably fake (sorry to all the naturist models who are trying to make friends).
In short, if it feels uncomfortable, or it feels like this is your lucky day, you’re about to walk into a trap.
It’s also important to determine what you like to get out of an online naturist friendship. Are you just looking for naturists to talk to, or are you looking for someone with whom you could actually meet up one day? Many online naturists like to keep their conversations online. So if you’re looking for a real-life friend, you might want to be clear about this from the beginning.
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