The email from my editor arrived on a drizzly Tuesday. “Great piece idea—professional workwear for commuters. You know, practical but stylish office clothes for people using public transport. Due next…
The first time I wore a Barbour jacket in London, I felt like I was in costume. Fresh off the train from visiting my friend Charlotte’s family home in Norfolk,…
The invitation sat on my kitchen counter for three days before I could bring myself to respond. “Would be delighted if you could join us at Hatherly for the weekend…
Let me confess something straight away: despite writing a fashion column for years and cultivating what I like to think is a fairly discerning eye for style, I have a…
Let me share something I haven’t told anyone besides my accountant and my most non-judgmental friend: I haven’t bought a new designer item in eight months. For someone who’s spent…
Last summer, I found myself at a garden party in Oxfordshire that was so quintessentially English it bordered on self-parody. The setting was a rambling country house with that particular…
There’s something weirdly fascinating about seeing TV presenters in the wild, isn’t there? Like spotting teachers at the supermarket when you’re a kid—that shock of realising they exist outside the…
Let me paint you a picture. It’s December 14th. The time is 6:43pm. I’m wedged in the armpit of a stranger on the Northern Line, sweat beading despite the subzero…
Last Saturday, I was in Marlborough—that picturesque Wiltshire town where the high street looks like it was designed specifically for Richard Curtis to film charming scenes of Englishness—when I spotted…
Every May, like clockwork, fashion magazines and websites across Britain optimistically trot out their summer capsule wardrobe features. You’ve seen them—all breezy linen shirts, strappy sandals, and floaty dresses in…
There’s a particular type of rain that exists only in Britain. Not the dramatic tropical downpours that have the decency to announce themselves with darkening skies and ominous rumbles. Not…
The first time I wore tartan to London Fashion Week, I thought I was being ironic and subversive. This was 2010, and my vintage Vivienne Westwood tartan mini worn with…