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What to wear to bed on a hot summer night? The obvious answer is “nothing at all.” But sometimes decorum (or the firm belief that you’re one of the lost Bennet sisters of Longbourn) calls for a pretty, whisper-light nightgown, right?
Maybe not. Romantic nightgowns are divisive. You either love them or you’re violently opposed to them. My sister turns green at the thought of ruffles and tucks at bedtime; my teenage daughter calls me Wee Willie Winkie – or worse, Scrooge – when she sees me floating down the stairs in mine and asks where my flashlight is.
But nightgown haters beware. Romantics are in high season: we are in the middle of summer, the temperature is right, the latest series of Bridgerton it’s still fresh in the mind And a new nightgown collaboration between two nostalgic British brands is on the horizon.
“A flowing nightgown evokes the idea of a perfect English summer,” says Emily Campbell of Yes only yes, the sleepwear brand she inherited from her mother and renamed in 2020. Her sheer cotton gauze and cambric nightgowns with dropped ruffles and milkmaid necklines are more sensual than sensible. “All of our designs are rooted in memories, nostalgia and romance, something that will never go out of style because it simply makes women feel beautiful.”
On July 2, If Only If launches its new collection made in collaboration with Cabbages and roses, the furniture and clothing brand beloved since its founding in 2000 by the late Christina Strutt, for its faded farmhouse aesthetic. The three-piece capsule consisting of two adult and one children’s nightgowns with vintage-inspired floral prints is the perfect outfit for enjoying nostalgic cups of tea at dawn and smelling roses barefoot. “Those distressed prints are beautiful and so intrinsic to that light, buoyant feeling you want on a hot summer night,” says Campbell.
The Christina model, named after Strutt, is a print of pink rose bouquets on organic cotton voile; The Violet model, named after Violet Dent, now creative director of Cabbages & Roses, is a design that can be worn from day to night: a rose sprig print on a bio-based modal fabric. “We made it more like Cabbages,” Dent says. “A very A-line cut with extra fabric for more movement, and we kept the ruching, something Emily does perfectly.”
Dent remembers Strutt’s prized collection of nightgowns. “She had a whole section of her wardrobe dedicated to them, hanging in a row. I remember him saying that he wished all that was in his wardrobe was a white nightgown because it looked so good.”
If Only If is one of the small British brands that brings old-fashioned romance to sleepwear. The London-based brand Faunawhich started with children’s sleepwear and moved into adult styles in 2020, is inspired by the French cotton sleepwear with lace that designer Nicola Niblett used to find at the Porte de Clignancourt flea market in Paris when she was working in the city in the 2000s. “We used cotton, vintage lace, pleats in our designs, all those things that we initially fell in love with,” she says. The costumes from films like Picnic at Hanging Rock, The eternal dream and The virgin suicides He constantly appears as inspiration on your mood boards..
Popular styles for summer include sleeveless dresses. Gardenia with lace inserts, cornflower print Vivienneand the bestseller, camelliawith ruffled sleeves of schiffli cotton lace that fall like wings at the back. “Some of the designs have evolved into day dresses,” says Niblett, who has also recently added a line of blouses and camisoles. “And many of our clients put slips on under their sleepwear and wear them out of bed.” (If Only If has recently started selling a naked slide from his collection (Precisely for this purpose.)
Olivia Morris, a footwear designer and former design director at Lulu Guinness, who has ventured into vintage-inspired home goods and accessories with her brand, Olivia morris at homeMorris is a self-confessed “nightgown obsessive,” a habit that began when she was a teenager and found a Victorian nightgown in a vintage shop in Galway, Ireland. While Morris doesn’t make nightgowns herself (“I think other people make them really well”), she was drawn to the idea of accessorizing sleepwear so it could be worn all day. Her slippers and dressing gowns are meant to complement and complete a romantic, vintage aesthetic based on a pretty nightgown or slip. The dressing gowns, handmade in Sussex, are cut from cotton fabrics, 1960s and 1970s embroidered linens, and chintzy fabrics. “They’re all unused linens, so they’re beautifully pristine,” she says.
Other resources for light sleepers include: Cologne and cottonwhich has five stores in the UK and has been a little-known source of pretty cotton nightgowns for over 30 years. Desmond & Dempsey, known for its printed pajama sets, is also now dabbling in nightgown styles, with its most romantic design yet being this season’s. Floating nightgowna three-layer organic cotton mini dress with a porcelain blue floral print and wide ruffled sleeves. Wearing it is described on the brand’s website as “feeling like you’re going commando.” Which, as mentioned at the start, will always be the most romantic sleepwear style of all.