We are Water Women!

We are a new CIC, launched in the UK in 2026 with a mission to offer courses of trauma-informed surf therapy to women who have experienced domestic and sexual trauma. Through access to Blue Spaces, we want to create opportunities for our surfers to learn new skills, create community and build confidence.

Founded by friends Siona and Sophie, we have known each other since we were five years old and grew up together swimming in pools and rivers and seas. Many of our happiest memories together have been in and around water.

We are passionate about empowering women who have experienced trauma through access to the water. Siona is a Social Worker and Surf Coach who has been working towards bringing her two professions together for the last five years. While studying to become a Social Worker, she wrote her thesis on Blue Space Health & Intervention Therapies. Sophie is a civil servant with a background in the humanitarian aid sector working for the UN and international NGOs. Siona taught Sophie to surf in India. It then became a much-loved way to unwind whilst Sophie was living and working in Myanmar, and has been ever since.

Together we are Water Women. And so are you.

Water Women is proud to have partnered with the domestic violence charity Next Link, who support women in the Bristol area and through whom we are receiving our referrals. Our first six-week course will take place at The Wave in Bristol this autumn and will allow us to pilot the course we have developed.

This first cohort and the data and testimonials we hope to collect from our surfers will provide the foundation for more courses for more women in the future.

We are grateful that our first course has already been funded in full. The money we raise here will go towards Water Women rash vests, so that our surfers are safe and stylish in the water; an emergency travel fund to support any surfer without transport who might otherwise struggle to access the course; and funding our second course and second cohort in spring 2027.

It's taken a lot of work to get us here and we are only just beginning, but we are so grateful to you for supporting us along this journey. Any donation is gratefully received and helps us support more women into the water.