When Love Island Makes You Panic-Buy at 10 PM (And Why I Keep Doing It Anyway)

I was literally mid-bite into leftover pad thai, watching Love Island on my laptop because my TV is ancient and doesn’t do streaming properly, when I saw it. This girl – I think her name was Sophie? – walked into the villa wearing the most gorgeous burnt orange crochet cover-up that somehow made her look like a sunset goddess instead of, you know, someone who’d raided a craft store’s clearance bin.

My fork stopped halfway to my mouth. That cover-up was… familiar. Really familiar.

Without even thinking, I opened a new tab and started frantically typing into ASOS’s search bar. “Orange crochet cover up” – boom, there it was. £28.99, marked down from £45. Three sizes left: XS, S, and XL. I’m solidly a medium, so obviously I started that internal debate we all know too well. Could I squeeze into a small? Would an XL work as an oversized beach vibe?

Two minutes later – literally two minutes, I timed it because I’m that person now – I refreshed the page. Gone. Completely sold out. Every single size, vanished into the digital ether while I was busy calculating whether I could survive in a size small.

“Are you kidding me right now,” I said out loud to my empty apartment, because apparently I’ve reached that level of online shopping frustration where I talk to myself.

This was my introduction to what I now know as the Love Island Effect, and honestly? It’s changed how I think about fashion, shopping, and the weird psychology of wanting things just because attractive people on reality TV are wearing them.

For anyone who’s managed to avoid Love Island – first of all, how, and second, teach me your ways – it’s basically a villa full of ridiculously good-looking twenty-somethings in Spain, coupling up and breaking up while wearing increasingly tiny pieces of fabric that somehow cost more than my monthly groceries. What started as trashy reality TV has accidentally become the most powerful fashion influencer in the UK, and the numbers are honestly insane.

I got curious about this whole phenomenon – occupational hazard of being a designer, I guess, I analyze everything – so I started tracking it. Items featured on Love Island sell out within twenty minutes of appearing on screen. Not hours. Minutes. I’ve watched the real-time search spikes on shopping apps during episodes, and it’s like watching a heart attack happen in data form.

A friend who works at one of the big online retailers told me over drinks that they literally have people whose job is to watch the show live and push featured items to their homepage before the episode ends. Can you imagine having “Love Island monitor” on your resume? Actually, don’t answer that, because I’m pretty sure I’ve accidentally made it part of mine.

Last summer, because I apparently have too much time on my hands, I decided to properly track this madness. For two weeks straight, I monitored every identifiable piece of clothing that appeared on screen and watched how fast they disappeared from stores. The results were wild – 73% of items were completely gone within 24 hours. The fastest sellout? A turquoise bikini with gold chain details that vanished from four different websites in under eight minutes. Eight! I’ve spent longer choosing what flavor of instant ramen to have for dinner.

The whole thing has basically rewired how high street fashion works. I was talking to someone who works as a buyer for a major retailer – can’t name names, but you’ve definitely shopped there – and she admitted they now design pieces specifically with Love Island in mind. They call them “villa ready” in their meetings, which is both hilarious and slightly dystopian. The criteria? Looks good on camera, photographs well for Instagram, under £50, and can be manufactured quickly enough to capitalize on the hype.

Look, I’m not proud of this, but I’ve absolutely fallen down this rabbit hole myself. Multiple times. There was the strappy sandal incident where I had the item in my cart, was literally entering my payment details, and it sold out before I could hit “confirm order.” I sat there staring at the “this item is no longer available” message like it had personally insulted my entire family.

Then there was the cut-out mini dress I panic-bought at 10:30 PM because some contestant wore it during a particularly dramatic recoupling. Did I need a dress with strategic holes cut out of it? Absolutely not. Did it look good on me? Also no – I looked like I’d been attacked by overzealous craft scissors. Do I still have it hanging in my closet as a monument to my poor impulse control? Unfortunately, yes.

The worst part? I’ve developed actual strategies for this. Like, I have a system now, which is probably the most embarrassing thing I’ll admit in print. First rule: start searching before the episode ends. The girls’ outfits usually come from the same handful of brands – PrettyLittleThing, ASOS, Oh Polly, all the usual suspects. As soon as you spot something you want, don’t wait for a perfect screenshot or anything. Search by color and item type because the actual product names are usually something ridiculous like “Sunset Babe Feeling Yourself Mesh Bodycon.”

Second strategy: follow the contestants on Instagram before they even enter the villa. Their management teams – because of course they have management teams now – post “get the look” links while episodes are airing. It’s calculated and obvious and I click every single time because I have no self-control.

The truly dedicated join Facebook groups specifically for identifying Love Island fashion. I’m not even joking – there are thousands of people who can spot a pair of earrings from three pixels of background footage. These groups are like CSI: Miami but for fast fashion. I once watched someone correctly identify a bracelet that appeared for approximately 1.2 seconds behind someone’s left shoulder. The detective skills are genuinely impressive and slightly terrifying.

Brands have obviously gotten wise to all this. Many now pay huge amounts to have their pieces featured, working directly with the show’s stylists. A PR friend told me over too many cocktails that one of her clients paid “well into five figures” to have their dresses worn during a particularly dramatic episode. The investment paid off – they sold out within an hour and had to emergency-order three more production runs just to keep up with demand.

What’s really interesting is how the effect has evolved beyond just copying exact pieces. Now there’s this whole “inspired by” market – items that aren’t identical to what was on the show but capture the same vibe. You’ll see entire website sections labeled “Villa Style” or “Island Vibes” without ever mentioning Love Island directly because those licensing fees are expensive.

But here’s what keeps me up at night: is this actually good for how we consume fashion? I’m genuinely conflicted about it. On one hand, it’s democratizing style inspiration in a way. Love Island contestants aren’t all from privileged backgrounds like a lot of fashion influencers. They’re not all from London, not all size 8, not all trust fund babies who went to fashion school.

On the other hand, it’s fast fashion on absolute steroids. The environmental impact of producing items designed to be relevant for literally one evening is… well, it’s not great, is it? And I say this as someone who has definitely contributed to the problem with my own 10 PM impulse purchases.

I was at dinner with some other fashion people recently, and after enough wine, the conversation inevitably turned to Love Island. One editor from a very fancy magazine admitted she has a separate credit card just for “Love Island emergencies” to hide the purchases from her partner, which honestly made me feel better about my own questionable life choices. Another confessed to calling in favors from brand contacts to get sold-out items shipped from press offices after seeing them on screen.

The most surprising admission came from someone who covers menswear, who claimed he’d noticed upticks in certain styles after they appeared on the male contestants – though he’d “rather die than admit that to readers.” Fashion is weird, you guys.

If you’re wondering whether any of this lasts beyond the show itself, the answer is complicated. Some contestants – usually the ones who make it to the finals and don’t get dumped in week three – turn their villa fame into real fashion influence. Million-pound brand deals, their own clothing lines, front row seats at fashion week. Others fade back to regular life, their brief moment as style influencers disappearing faster than that orange crochet cover-up.

So here I am, gearing up for another season, knowing I’ll inevitably find myself with a glass of cheap wine and my laptop open, watching impossibly attractive people lounge around a Spanish villa while my credit card sits dangerously close to hand. I keep telling myself I’ll be more mindful this time. Maybe implement a 24-hour cooling-off period before buying anything (though we all know these items won’t last 24 minutes, let alone hours). Maybe set a “Love Island budget” (I definitely won’t stick to it).

Or maybe I’ll just accept that twice a year, I’m going to end up with a couple of questionable fashion purchases that seemed absolutely essential at 10 PM on a Tuesday. There are worse ways to spend money, right? Right?

If you’re planning to join this peculiar British shopping tradition, here’s my advice: have your payment details saved, your wifi working properly, and maybe a friend on standby who’ll text you “do you REALLY need another cut-out bodysuit though?” when things get dangerous. Because sometimes we all need someone to save us from ourselves, especially when there’s drama happening in the villa and everyone’s dressed to absolutely kill.

Just don’t blame me when that strappy dress you’ve been eyeing disappears before the first ad break. I warned you.