Laura Lee Cascada is a land-locked mermaid making waves for a just and sustainable world. She is a queer writer, activist, and budding ukulele player living in the mountains of Virginia with her furry, scaly, and oinky family members. For over 15 years, Laura has campaigned for a better planet, including in her current role as Senior Director of Campaigns at the Better Food Foundation, where she works to reshape our food norms to be plant-based, by default.

Laura earned her master’s degree in environmental policy from the Johns Hopkins University. She is the founder of Plight of the Hermies, a grassroots campaign advocating for wild hermit crab freedom, as well as The Every Animal Project, a collection of true stories and photographs of animals around the globe that is transforming how we relate with other species—with a print anthology now out: The Dog Who Wooed at the World. She published her debut novel, Dellie’s Run, in 2019, highlighting one being’s remarkable journey to freedom through a big dream: baseball. Laura also helped found and managed PR/marketing for the annual Hampton Roads VegFest for four years and has led social justice campaigns for groups like Northern Shenandoah Valley Unites.

In her downtime, Laura can be found traveling the globe in search of waterfalls; eating copious amounts of avocados; playing the ukulele; balancing rocks; and, of course, transforming into a mermaid. She is a PADI-certified mermaid and freediver, and her favorite place to go mermaiding is her second home, the Big Island of Hawaii. Her Vegan Mermaid Warrior Instagram and TikTok accounts, through which she has reached hundreds of thousands of people, host videos on environmental, animal, and social justice and bring awareness to her chronic illness, ME/CFS.

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Projects

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