"From First Swims to Global Impact."
Water confidence, wellbeing, and leadership for every stage of the journey

WaveMakers & Ripple effects

UK Summer Pilot 2025
Join the water, Find your power, Change lives.

What is Bold Waters?

A movement for equity, wellbeing, and water justice.

Bold Waters is a social impact movement using nature and open water to build confidence, connection, and long-term change.

We exist to challenge the deep inequities around access to swimming, safety, and nature, particularly for communities historically excluded from aquatic and outdoor spaces. Drowning is a global issue that disproportionately affects these communities, and for too long, many have felt excluded from aquatic and outdoor spaces.

Bold Waters is changing that.

Our work is multi-layered and cross generational, combining swim safety and water confidence with wellness, employability, and leadership. We create practical pathways that remove barriers and empower people not just to participate but to lead.

At the heart of Bold Waters is a belief:

Nature is for everyone. Water is for everyone. Leadership is for everyone.

Through three core programmes, we support individuals at every stage:

  • Fear to Flow (All ages 14+): we run under and over 18 sessions a supportive entry point for those facing fear or uncertainty around water, designed to build comfort, awareness, and open water confidence

  • WaveMakers (14–21): an introduction to water safety, nature, and wellbeing

  • Ripple Effect Retreats (Adults): immersive experiences for rest, reconnection, and water confidence

  • Global Flow (18+): an international leadership and employability programme with real world qualifications and global teaching placements

Whether it’s your first time in open water or the start of a new career, Bold Waters opens the door to possibility, purpose, and global impact.

Why It Matters

Fear of water doesn’t come from nowhere.
For many, it’s passed down through generations shaped by exclusion, bad experiences, or simply never being given the chance. When you grow up feeling like water, nature, or leadership spaces aren’t for you, it impacts your confidence, your wellbeing, and the future you believe is possible.

We’re here to change that.

Each year, hundreds of lives are lost to drowning in the UK and over 300,000 globally. Most of these deaths happen in open water and disproportionately affect young people from racially minoritised, low-income, and historically excluded communities. In 2023 alone, 236 people died from water-related incidents in the UK. The barriers are clear: limited swim access, lack of safety education, fear, and disconnection from natural spaces.

Bold Waters exists to interrupt this cycle from every angle.

We combine water safety with confidence building, wellbeing, and nature immersion. We create safe, supported entry points for those who feel afraid, overlooked, or unwelcome. And we offer pathways into qualifications, leadership, and employment helping participants move from fear, to confidence, to purpose.

Our approach is holistic. Participants don’t just learn how to stay afloat they reconnect with nature, rediscover their voice, and develop the tools to lead change. They leave with real world skills, lifelong memories, and a sense of belonging in places they were never meant to be excluded from.

We believe that water safety is a right, not a privilege.
That wellbeing is a form of justice.
That nature is for everyone.
And that every person deserves the chance to explore, lead, and live without fear.

Fear to Flow

Reclaim calm. Rewrite your story. Begin again in open water.

Fear to Flow is a supported introduction to open water for anyone aged 14+ who feels unsure, anxious, or disconnected from water. Many of our participants have never swum before or haven’t in years. This isn’t about swimming lengths. It’s about feeling safe enough to show up, slow down, and take that first step in your own time, and in your own way.

Led by instructors with lived experience and cultural understanding, each experience includes:

  • Trauma-aware guidance and open water orientation

  • Gentle movement, breathwork, and observation practices

  • Group reflection and story sharing

  • Small group support, trust building, and emotional safety

  • Flexible in-water confidence sessions based on readiness

Fear to Flow is the beginning of a new relationship with water not about performance, but about presence. For some, it’s also a bridge into WaveMakers or Ripple Effect Retreats.

“This is where it begins. With calm, courage, and community.”

WaveMakers

Confidence. Community. First Steps Into Open Water.

WaveMakers is an introductory programme for young people aged 14–21 that opens access to wild swimming, nature, and water safety.

Designed for youth from underserved communities, WaveMakers supports participants in building water confidence, improving wellbeing, and developing early leadership skills in a space where they feel seen, safe, and supported.

Delivered through schools, colleges, and youth organisations, each experience includes:

  • Water safety education and open water sessions

  • Nature based wellbeing workshops

  • Group activities that build trust, self esteem, and connection

  • A culturally competent, trauma informed approach to swimming and wellness

WaveMakers is more than a swim session it’s a first step into nature, confidence, and community. For some, it’s also the start of a longer journey into leadership through our Global Flow programme.

Global Flow

From Local Leadership to Global Impact

Global Flow is our flagship programme. A six month leadership and employability programme for young people ready to step into purpose.
Designed for underserved communities, it offers access to qualifications, international experience, and the chance to lead real change.

Participants will:

  • Gain lifeguarding and swim instructor qualifications

  • Build skills in leadership, communication, and cultural competency

  • Receive mentorship and join a peer community

  • Take part in a four-week international teaching placement

  • Support global drowning prevention and become a Bold Waters ambassador

Whether they go into aquatics or apply these skills elsewhere, participants leave with confidence, qualifications, and a global outlook.

“This is more than a programme. It’s a pathway to purpose.”

Ripple Effect Retreats

Rest. Reconnection. Water Confidence.

Ripple Effect Retreats offer space to pause, heal, and reconnect with nature, with water, and with yourself.

Designed for adults seeking rest, restoration, and a renewed sense of confidence, these two-day retreats are especially supportive for those who’ve felt disconnected from nature or excluded from outdoor and aquatic spaces.

We are mindful of the fears many adults carry around water. Whether you’re overcoming water anxiety, looking to build confidence for yourself or your family, or simply craving a deeper connection with the outdoors , Ripple Effect gently guides you back to belonging.

Each retreat includes:

  • Guided nature swimming and water confidence sessions (grouped by comfort level)

  • Fireside talks, yoga, and reflective wellbeing workshops

  • Time to rest, journal, and reconnect in nature and in community

  • Outdoor luxury bell tents, real beds, and nourishing shared meals

Ripple Effect is luxurious, restorative, and grounded in care.
And every booking helps fund our youth programmes supporting the next generation of safe, confident, and connected leaders.

“This is water for healing. Nature for restoration. Community for transformation.”