What to wear when the temperatures really rise as they have done in London this week. A cool cotton maxi dress is the answer. I bought this long pleated navy maxi dress from Cos last year. It has proved to be one of my favourite dresses. I remember wearing it out to lunch on my birthday last year. If the weather continues to be hot this July I will probably be wearing it for a celebratory lunch on our patio this year.
If you do not like the sleeveless look my dress has a matching jacket which you can see in a previous post. Personally, when the temperatures get over 30c I am ok with sleeveless especially when I am in France where it can get up to 40c in the South. My silver butterfly scarf is from Chicatanyage shop. Silver sandals by Gabor. I found a good selection of their very comfortable sandals on sale here. The style I am wearing is available in navy, brown and metallic here.
If you do own a sleeveless dress another good way to cover the upper arms is with a lightweight cotton scarf. The one I am wearing above is our rose/silver butterfly print scarf available at Chicatanyage shop.
The sales are now on in most shops so I have listed my favourites below. There are some fantastic bargains to be had however you need to be quick as sizes are selling out fast.
MeandEm – Some further reductions. I have my eye on their tee shirts. They are good quality and wash well without going out of shape.
Hush – Their collection has been excellent this year. I am tempted by some of their colourful tops.
Fitflop – Where I buy most of my comfortable shoes and sandals.
Boden – Another brand which has some great classics this season.
Hopefashionuk – Good summer staples. I especially love this dress.
Everlane – Sustainable brand – classic styles.
The White company – Excellent for bed linen, home accessories and classic clothing.
Anthropologie – I like the look of their Kaye Blazer.
Chico’s – For casual wear
Nordstrom have a clearance sale including some Eileen Fisher.
I love your suggestions.
Thank you for making fashion interesting for my age.
That dress really suits you!
I love this dress on you. The color and the style are just perfect. I don’t wear dresses much but in the summer heat they are the way to go!
That looks like a lovely cool cotton dress for a hot summer’s day. The pleats appear to allow it to be comfortably loose without it becoming tent like and a good cotton fabric is so wearable in this (unusually warm for the UK) weather. The addition of your rose pink scarf really lifts it but in this weather, I think I’d opt for it draped around my shoulders rather than tied around my neck! 🙂
You do a very good job of modelling Gabor’s sandals Josephine and I have purchased several pairs after seeing your blog. It’s about time they realised that showing shoes on someone’s feet/legs, gives the potential purchaser a much better idea of what they (might) look like on them rather than just showing pictures of ‘naked’ shoes in most of their advertising.
Keep up the good work Josephine.
I love this navy dress too, and the jacket that you purchased with it. I wish both were still available. Is there anything from Cos that you recommend this summer?
Hello Francie
I did a lot of research to see if I could find any similar styles. The small images at the bottom of the post illustrate what I could find (there are a few on the bottom row from Cos). The brand should show on the images however for some tech reason it is not working properly. Most of the brands are not holding a lot of stock at the moment so sizes are selling out very quickly. By the time I post the blog many styles are already sold out. I think that this is going to be a problem for some time to come.
Many thanks for your response, Josephine.