A worker covers mounds of rice with a giant hat-shaped bamboo cone in a field in Brahmanbaria, Bangladesh on September 21, 2023 after they have been dried in the scoring sun. (Photo by Joy Saha/Rex Features/Shutterstock)

A fire dancer makes a heart shape at the Bealtaine fire festival, marking the beginning of summer at the Hill of Uisneach in Rathnew, Ireland, on May 10, 2025. (Photo by Clodagh Kilcoyne/Reuters)

While the lido was described as bringing “modernism to the masses” on the British coast it was just the latest example of a trend that had been developing since Victorian times – transforming seaside towns into resorts for leisure and entertainment. In the latter half of the nineteenth century, the fashion was for local authorities to build great piers stretching from the promenade out into the sea. The Eastbourne Pier, pictured here in May 1931, was erected between 1866 and 1870 to an ingenious design by Eugenius Birch, which saw the structure sitting on special cups allowing the supporting struts to “move” in bad weather. Arranged on the pier's 1,000-foot length were kiosks, a theatre, a ballroom and a camera obscura. 1931. (Photo by Aerofilms Collection via “A History of Britain From Above”)

A man dressed as a “Trapajon”, representing entities of nature, poses for a picture after taking part in the Vijanera Festival in Silio, northern Spain, Sunday, Jan. 6, 2013. The Vijanera masquerade, of pre-Roman origin, is the first carnival of the year in Europe symbolizing the triumph of good over evil and involving the participation of crowds of residents wearing different masks, animal skins and brightly colored clothing with its own complex function and symbolism and becoming the living example of the survival of archaic cults to nature. (Photo by Daniel Ochoa de Olza/AP Photo)

Freya Smith aged three, leads one of Erth’s giant dinosaur puppets across the road on August 6, 2019 in Edinburgh, Scotland. Australian theatre company Erth presents their best-selling show Dinosaur’s Zoo as part of Underbelly’s Fringe programme. Featuring giant dinosaur puppets which walk, roar and blink like the real thing, Dinosaur’s Zoo is a perfect example of edutainment for children of all ages, taking place at the McEwan Hall every day of the Fringe at 11am. (Photo by Jeff J. Mitchell/Getty Images)

Penitentes, or nieves penitentes (Spanish for “penitent-shaped snows”), are a snow formation found at high altitudes. They take the form of tall thin blades of hardened snow or ice, closely spaced with the blades oriented towards the general direction of the sun.

A staff member (R) looks on next to a cake, which was baked in the shape of a muscular man, for customers to try for free during a promotional event of a cake store in Shenyang, Liaoning province, China, December 6, 2015. (Photo by Reuters/Stringer)