The rules designed to keep male bathing machines at a set distance from female bathing machines were probably only in force for about 30 years, less in some places, and they were routinely flouted. By the 1890s the call for mixed bathing was getting stronger, not least because this was the norm in northern European as well as American resorts. As it became more acceptable for people to walk across the beach in their bathing costumes, villages of stripy changing tents were erected on the Edwardian sands. Around the same time some of the bathing machines began to lose their wheels and other, purpose-built, day huts began to appear.

In the inter-War period sunbathing was the new fashion and bathing machines, though still lingering on, were outdated and antiquated. New modern-looking blocks of beach huts or chalets were built near to huge lidos and everywhere had to have a sun terrace.

The last of the bathing machines disappeared with the Second World War and when the beaches had been cleared of barbed wire at the end of hostilities, the holiday makers came back in their millions. The 1950s was the heyday of the beach hut but dedicated fans have been keeping up their huts ever since and today there’s a clear resurgence with spiralling prices and much media interest.

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Beach Huts at Southend

  Beach Huts at Westward Ho!