Summer Wardrobe Try-On and my Staying Fresh Trick!

This week finds me doing what I do every single year, at about this time: obsessively searching for the magical keystone wardrobe items that will fix all of my dressing woes.

As soon as it gets hot, my intolerance of having any restrictive clothing touching me increases to absurd levels, so that my ideal garment would basically be a cotton sack with a hole cut into it for my head and two holes for the arms.

AD info: this post is a sponsored post with Dove. Links are affiliate links.

And it’s not the sweatiness, or stickiness of the situation that irks me: it’s almost entirely a sensory one. The roughness of a seam feels eighty times worse if the mercury is rising and tempers are flaring. An elasticated waistband? Absolutely not.

Anyway, I have the sweatiness and stickiness issue completely covered thanks to (smooth segue here) Dove Whole Body Deodorant, which is a brand new range built for places for places beyond the underarms - in addition to regular deodorant. Think: gap between the boobs that becomes a sweat conduit as soon as temperatures creep above twenty-five degrees. Creases behind the underboob. Channels of pure humidity and clamminess that sit at the tops of the thighs. Let’s face it, these places are absolute carnage zones when the heat turns up.

So, Dove Whole Body Deodorant comes in three formats and three fragrances: the Whole Body Spray, Whole Body Stick and Whole Body Cream. Obviously my most-used so far has been the spray, because I am a child of the eighties and therefore a teen of the nineties and grew up spraying myself liberally with the popular body sprays of the time. Charlie Red, Dewberry, Impulse. This is not the same thing at all, it is the considered version, the mature version: beautiful scents (Raspberry & Rose, Lavender & Chamomile, Sea Mist & Peony) but with a formula that delivers all day odour protection as well as nourishing oils and (incredibly, considering all of this) a quick-dry finish that feels, to me, completely weightless.

And with the same brilliant satisfaction that only an all-over spray session can give. That instant veil of scent, the cooling sensation, the feeling of being immediately freshened and fresh - CAN HIGHLY RECOMMEND A CHEEKY MIDDAY SPRAY ON THE FEET AND BACK, thank me later - and the convenience of the no-touch application.

The Whole Body Stick and Whole Body Cream take things to another level again, feeling more like ultra-moisturising skincare, to me, than anything deodorising. Very clever and designed for chest, thighs and intimate areas, all tested to be gentle and suitable for the particular areas they’re meant to be applied in.

I’ll be back with another post and a deeper review on these, because I am currently working my way through all three formats and fragrances (most-used so far is Raspberry & Rose but it’s a close call) but I can tell you that they are already a brilliant addition to my bodycare line-up, and will be all year round. A deodorant that you can use all over, with added skincare so that it feels beautiful to apply and comfortable to wear? Yes please to feeling fresh and confident all day!

You can pick up Dove Whole Body at selected retailers - details here.

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And so to this year’s heated, frantic search for clothes that won’t stick to me like a moist, clammy shower-curtain: I'm looking for a light-as-air dress that will feel like a silken sack but not look like one, ideally sleeveless and sexy, which I realise is a ridiculous request to send out there into the universe. And then I want some slightly smart, tailored shorts that won’t cut across my gut, or make me feel as though my undercarriage has been garrotted when I sit down, but they must not be linen because linen is the absolute work of the devil - I am convinced of it - when it comes to any sort of clothing that has to sit around the crotch. Being left with an explosion of creases and wrinkles that radiate outwards from your groin like a giant star is just not the look you want.

The last piece in my triumvirate of summer fashion figureheads is to be the lightweight jacket. Because for every one of the heatwave days, when we curse the fact we don’t have air con fitted, there are at least twelve-to-fifteen days of overcast mizzle, average temperature fifteen degrees, not cool enough for a jumper but too cool for just the cotton sack. I want something slouchy and undone, something I can throw on over a summer dress but also over the tracksuit I don’t own yet (can’t find one with the correct waistband height) or the soft-as-butter leggings I do own but can’t bring myself to wear, because they basically provide a full gynaecological map of my nethers to anyone who happens to glance down below my naval. (From behind, I may as well have been body-painted. They leave nothing to the imagination. I cannot fathom wearing them out in public.)

Here are my discoveries so far: mostly from Hush. I have to say that my hunt hasn’t been entirely successful - even looking at these pictures now, with the benefit of distance and hindsight, viewing myself as others might view me in the things I’ve been trying on, I’m not entirely sure they’re right.

1 The Shorts

These are Hush. The Cordi shorts. Nearly all of my favourite shorts have been from Hush and I’ve worn them all to fabric-death, where holes have appeared and seams have unravelled and waistbands have gone stretched and loose from years of washing. (Long-term readers and Instagram followers will remember the Green Shorts.)

I usually go for a cargo shape, with the shorts, but is this higher waistband and looser leg slightly smarter? Am I ready for this shape? They’re certainly very cool and comfy. I like that they are just about high waisted enough that they nip in at the right place and cover the area around my belly-button, which is so mashed-up from babies that it looks like the Sarlacc Pit, that horrible hole that Jabba the Hut threw his enemies into for a certain and disgustingly painful death.

Boba Fett escaping the Sarlacc Pit, aka my belly button.

How do we feel about these Hush shorts? Are they getting consigned to the returns pile or do they look very useful? I’m erring towards the latter but could easily be convinced otherwise.

The Hush Cordi Cotton Shorts are here

2 The Dress

Onto the Hush Air Flow dress. Funny silky feel to the fabric on this one that doesn’t necessarily feel light, if anything it has a weight to it - it reminds me of the bias cut Ghost dresses of the nineties - but this does make it drape nicely and hang elegantly as you move.

Am I cock a hoop about it? I’m still searching for alternatives, put it that way.

Hush Air-Flow Dress is here online.

3 The Jacket

I actually think I may have found what I want, here - hurrah! An oversized jacket that is soft and drapey and comfortable but looks denim. For my entire life I have tried to be the sort of person who can wear a denim jacket, but as soon as I put one on I feel as though I’m wearing something that has been constructed from blue paper and cardboard. Did you ever make a robot costume out of a cardboard box when you were little? Wearing a denim jacket always feels a bit like that, to me.

This denim-ish jacket (we’re with Hush again, I did try on other brands but these were the best bits!) is not rigid. It is soft, almost so soft you’d want to sleep in it, and I like the detailing at the back and on the sleeves that stops it from just being a big slouchy blob of nothing, but: there’s the worry that despite all of this, it does still look like a big slouchy blob of nothing.

Thoughts?

The Robbie Jacket from Hush is here

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Right, I’m off to do some squats in the sauna and see how Dove Whole Body Deodorant Stick fares. Hahaha….

Shop Dove Whole Body Deodorant now at selected retailers.