Naked Men Talking: Dan Morgan
We talk swimming ponds, cruising, and an iconic tree.
For Naked Men Talking, I caught up with Dan Morgan - host of the Queer Encounters podcast.
In the conversation, we talk swimming ponds, cruising, and an iconic tree.
Queer Encounters is a podcast about the ways that queer people find and connect with each other. Why was this a project that you wanted to explore?
It didn't start as a podcast. It began as a very visual project.
I took a camera and a microphone to the beaches of Sitges and just awkwardly approached people.
How did you go from there to creating a podcast?
It was intended to be primarily a visual thing and the audio was going to be just introducing the person - I was just having chats with these people before taking photos of them.
I talked with a few galleries about how to display the work but none of it ended up being shown in a visual way. I was left with all this material and I just didn't want to waste it.
I listened to a podcast called Strangers on a Bench - it's simply this guy and he goes up to people on benches and he just has a conversation with them. They're not in any way a professional interview. They're not structured like an interview. They're just a conversation. I listened to that and I thought, I've got that - I've got that in a particular place and with a particular group of people that I really connect with.
It gave me permission just to take what I already had - I realised that the audio is the most special bit that I've got.
This entire first season of Queer Encounters is focused on Hampstead Heath - what drew you to Hampstead Heath?
We'd always gone to Hampstead Heath to swim - there's the male pond, a swimming pond exclusively for men.
In front of the male pond is the grassy area where I did a lot of the interviews.
It's such a unique homosocial space - a public homosocial space in London, full of queers. It's pretty special?
It feels like it's like a relic from a time past. I love it.
How do you identify someone that you think might have a good story?
One of the rules that I apply to it is I don't like to interview people that I know. In that first 30 minutes when you don't know a person, there's a really exciting point of discovery for me where I feel like I can prod and the person can also open up to you like a blank canvas.
They can give you a version of themselves that they may not give to anyone else?
Yes - the version they want to give.
As well as the swimming ponds, Hampstead Heath is synonymous with cruising. Your conversations get into the detail of that - was that something that you were deliberately looking to explore?
No, not really. In the interviews, people mentioned the fuck tree. The fuck tree is literally a tree where people fuck.
I took hundreds of photos of the tree to turn into a 3D model. All around the base of the tree are condom wrappers, lube, chocolate bar wrappers. If that fuck tree could talk it would have quite the monologue.
You could think that with the rise of hookup apps and the way that we use technology to communicate with each other that cruising is a thing of our past - why would we need to go cruising anymore? But what your conversations in Queer Encounters illustrates is that it's still very much part of the queer experience for some men?
Grindr now has become shit. I don't even know if people want to meet up. I think they just want to chat and share dick pics. Whereas cruising, someone's taken the time out of their day to go to a place - they've already committed more than most people do who are just scrolling on their phone at home.
A lot of the people that I spoke to in the cruising areas, I don't even think they were there primarily for the sex. It was just wanting to be in an atmosphere where you feel the the excitement in the air that things are happening - you feel alive.
How have your conversations evolved your understanding of the way that men find intimacy with each other? Should we all be cruising more instead of looking at our phones?
That feels like a very natural conclusion to take from it, but I also don't feel like that is a new perspective.
A big part of my interest in this project is from a point of technology - I'd like to think that there's a healthy, interesting role, that technology doesn't just slowly reduce us all to sitting scrolling aimlessly, but can somehow improve that connection.
Season One of Queer Encounters focuses on Hampstead Heath. Where are you taking us to in Season Two?
Me and my husband made a big move and came to Torremolinos in Spain. It's the gayest place, so Season Two will be all about the beach in Torremolinos.
The other season that I'm looking at at the moment is I want to go to the people on the Grindr grid and scan photograph and interview them - transport the listener to hear the stories of the men on the grid.
What do you hope that people feel when they're listening to Queer Encounters?
It would just be that people approach the listening with a curiosity. They're not the kind of interviews where you go in for a thing and it gives you the thing. There's a more ambling contemplative curiosity that I'd like people to inhabit.
I was really surprised by how articulate and interesting the people were that I talked to - I'd like people to open themselves up to connecting with each person and appreciating that it's a person and their life and their experience.
Queer Encounters: The Podcast
Queer Encounters is a podcast about the ways queer people find and connect with each other.
Host Dan Morgan meets strangers in queer spaces — parks, bars, beaches — and chats about what brings them there, what they’re looking for, and what connection means today.
Some conversations are brief, others open up into something funny, honest, or surprising.
From quiet paths to crowded nights out, Queer Encounters explores the small moments that shape queer life — cruising for connection, one conversation at a time.
Episodes will be released weekly. The first three episodes are now available.
Episode 1: Recovery, Heritage, and the Fuck Tree.
One minute it's a party on the Heath, the next someone shouts 'Police!' and 40 people are running for their lives.
In this episode, Dan Morgan sits down with an artist and long-time local who has seen it all. They discuss the deep-rooted queer history of the Heath, the infamous ‘Fuck Tree’, and a powerful personal journey from addiction to finding new kinds of queer spaces in recovery.
It’s an intimate, reflective, and surprisingly funny conversation.
Episode 2: Cruising Lessons, Pushing Boundaries and Experimentation.
For his first time on the Heath, he spent hours just sitting on the grass, completely terrified.
In this episode, host Dan Morgan meets Tom, a 23-year-old new to London and the scene. They talk about everything from the pressure of gay body standards and mental health to what it’s like to throw yourself into the deep end of new sexual experiences.
It’s a candid, charming, and surprisingly profound conversation.
Episode 3: Transitions, Selfridges, and Speedos.
Not everyone on Hampstead Heath is impressed with the 'Speedo and muscle' crowd.
In this episode, host Dan Morgan strikes up a conversation with Vanessa, a trans woman from Italy, and her friend. What follows is a completely unfiltered chat about the local scene, the real journey of gender transition, and what they hope for in the future.
It's a raw, funny, and honest snapshot of the kind of conversation you'd want to overhear.
The Men's Pond at Hampstead Heath, London. Photos: Dan Morgan.
Gareth Johnson