Pup. They/Them. Pup is posing on the floor, wrapped in a fluffy red tulle boa and smiling.

 In conversation with Maya Hart | Images by Sky Sirens’ Creative Team

Pup is looking to the side with a sultry expression. They are wearing neon yellow lingerie with champagne coloured fishnet stockings and large hooped earrings. They have tattoos along their shoulders and chest. The lighting is reddish purple.

Introduce yourself!

I first started at Sky Sirens in 2018, back before the downstairs expansion! I started with Lyra, and moved onto Sling, Pole & Burlesque. Burlesque scared me the most - but I enjoyed it a lot more than I thought I would. Burly ended up being my favourite class of all.

How do you identify?

I identify as fat. It just is what it is. I’m not quite at the stage of reclaiming it as positively as others who reclaim it positively as fat. It’s just what I consider myself as. I feel like as a non binary person, it makes it more difficult. I have big boobs. People look at me and see me as a woman. I feel like I can't come across as androgynously as I would like to, but if I was skinny, I would be able to. 

It’s so difficult to accept yourself with the way society raises women. I don’t identify as a woman but I spent a lot of my life thinking I was one and I was raised as if I am one. I work in a cafe, and a lot of people come up to me and say they can’t have one of our baked treats, saying “I’m trying to be good.” Especially as I have a history of an eating disorder, this is so frustrating to hear.

I say “you know there’s no bad food, right? Food is just fuel for your body.”

This is such a common thing in our society - so of course, it makes it difficult for us to accept ourselves.

How has your experience been as a student at Sky Sirens?

When I first started coming to Sky Sirens, I was really nervous. At most of the Pole Studios I have seen, everyone has been skinny and white, so I was really nervous that I wouldn’t fit in.

Doing Burlesque, especially, has made me feel a lot more comfortable coming to class and being myself.

Everyone who comes to classes here - they all have bodies that are so vastly different. It made it a lot easier knowing that I am not the odd one out.


Pup is sitting in a white lyra wearing soft pink lingerie holding a single red rose. They have their legs crossed. They are wearing clear pleaser sandals and bright red large square glasses.
Pup is wearing baby blue lingerie, holding a single red rose and looking off to the side. They have a lot of tattoos on their arms and chest, as well as large purple hooped earrings. The lighting is red in this image.