Stylish, Sustainable & (Mostly) Safe Suit


The only way of safely swimming or snorkelling in seas inhabited by box jellyfish is to wear a lycra suit. Maximum coverage means maximum protection, and the tentacles of a dangerous jellyfish cannot penetrate the fibre. The thing is, they don't look cool. Sea Gypsy may have just changed that.



Unless you're SCUBA diving or maybe surfing or water skiing or similar, you don't want to be wearing a clingy, full body spandex suit at the beach. You want a tan. You want to feel the warm water on your skin. You want to wear next to nothing. You're on holiday, it's Thailand, relax!

However, when you step foot into the sea, you are sharing a wild space with some seriously weird creatures and there are quite a number in the tropics that sting. Some more than others. You could scrape against some coral or get sea lice bites or be stung by a jellyfish.


A suit is practical, effective and, we would argue, essential. While the new women's range from Byron Bay's Salt Gypsy is more suited to the surf, they would provide good protection against a sting. There's not much mid-rift coverage (so we declare that it's actually somewhat compromised) but most stings are across arms and legs so this collection at least ticks the biggest boxes.

Note that 100% coverage of limbs and torso is ideal and recommended for optimum safety. Also, to any parents out there - PLEASE if anything else put your children in a full-length suit. Kids account for a high number of jellyfish sting victims. They don't mind wearing a suit, most think they look good, and it saves you covering them in sun cream - and could save their life!


The fact that this collection of ocean activewear looks great is bonus enough; however, as it is also sustainable having been made with regenerated nylon fibre using salvaged plastic debris including ghost nets, plastic bottles and industrial waste makes it even better.

It's apparently rated at UPF 50+ (Ultraviolet Protection Factor), is R-Certified (part of a renewable energy project) and uses ECONYL yarn (CLICK to find out more about ECONYL) SO by wearing this product in the sea you won't be depositing so much of your toxic sun cream in the water (because you won't really need it) AND you minimise the risk of sunburn and jellyfish stings PLUS you'll look cool in recycled pollution!


This blog's mantra is: suntan on the sand, suit in the sea! So there's no financial or other such interest here, just an interest in safety and encouraging people to lower the risk by wearing protective apparel.


Check out the Salt Gypsy collection here:




Have a look at these previous posts on protective suits:

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