Look: I’m not going to say you should dump two tons of sand on your living room floor, install some UV lamps, and call it a beach vacation, but I’m just going to put it out there as an option and let you use your best judgement.
These women are relaxing in solarium of the Tolland Hotel, in Bournemouth, a British seaside town that I know is very gray and needs all the UV assistance it can get because I was finally peer-pressured into watching The Durrells in Corfu, which follows a British family who bails for the sunnier climes of Greece. None of us are going to make it to the Aegean this year; even the public pool is looking ambitious at this moment. So, you know, there’s a precedent for your creative solutions.
It’s not the only such image, either. These people are baking in the “Branksome Solarium near Poole, Dorset, with its sanded floor and artificial sunshine containing beneficial ultra-violet rays, which can be switched on when the natural sunlight fails,” according to the description. There’s a mention of the spot in Designing the Seaside; apparently, it was part of a large bathing pavilion complex, one of several which “became the centrepieces of a radically new seafront architecture for a sun-based use of the beach and sea.” Again: just an idea!
