In summer, any beach on Ibiza becomes a real fashion catwalk where the latest trends in swimsuits coexist with the absence of them, an option chosen by those who prefer nudism.
But the elders of the place will perfectly remember other ‘normalities’, those that were implemented in 1938 on the island, in the middle of the Civil War.
Diario de Ibiza published in that year a decree of the delegate of Internal Security and Public Order of the Balearic Islands, Victor Enseñat, which established the rules to be observed on the beaches of the island entitled ‘Morality on the beach’.
‘Morality’
What now seems unthinkable, at that time was the law. And this stipulated, for example, that on the way from the deckchair to the water, when getting out of the water and while sunbathing, it was obligatory to wear a bathrobe. Men’s bathing suits had to be complete and cover the back, chest and sides, while women’s bathing suits had to include a knee-length skirt.
Years later the customs began to relax, the bathing suits that some tourists wore on the island covered less of their bodies… but in the middle of Franco’s regime, logically, the situation could not evolve much, at least legally. So much so that on July 6, 1957, when tourism was already a reality on the island and foreigners brought more open-minded airs, the Directorate General of Security published its Circular number 320 to recall the current rules regarding the “decorum on beaches and swimming pools. It was echoed by the Diario de Ibiza.
It is forbidden to wear ‘unseemly’ swimwear, i.e. bikinis (called ‘two-piece’) for women and ‘slips’ for men. The alternative for women is a swimsuit with a covered chest and back and a skirt, and for men it is a pair of sports pants.
In addition, the bathing suit can only be used ‘in the water’, and in no case while sunbathing -because the famous bathrobes were still in force- and much less in boats, beach bars, restaurants or walks along the coast.
Sunbathing could only be done in ‘solariums‘, which had to be closed to the outside and separated by sexes. All this at the dawn of the 1960s.
The years went by, more and more foreigners and liberal hippies arrived, but Francisco Franco continued to rule with an iron fist.
Nudism on Ibiza
Shortly after the death of the dictator, some laws enacted by him were still in force and on June 24, 1976, during the transition government of Arias Navarro and a few days before Adolfo Suárez assumed the presidency, Es Diari published that the Civil Guard, “in an effective service”, had arrested 51 nudists on the beach of Ses Salines. The news item notes that those arrested were Spaniards and foreigners and that all of them were fined 8,000 pesetas for “offence to morals and good customs”.
Finally, two years later, in August 1978, the practice of nudism was authorized on the beaches of Ibiza, but not all of them. Nudist beaches were declared to be es Cavallet, ses Salines, Aigües Blanques, on Ibiza, and ses Illetes on Formentera.
For the full article, please visit Diario de Ibiza website here.