‘The run ends in the centre of this beautiful village’: readers’ favourite small ski resorts in Euro

Life and style | The Guardian

From cosy Alpine villages to queue-free skiing, you tell us where to head to avoid the crowds

• Tell us about a conservation tourism experience – the best tip wins a £200 holiday voucher

Bad Gastein is a relatively unknown gem. The Austrian state it sits in, Salzburg, offers free local transport (the guest mobility ticket) if you are staying in the state, so you can travel to the resort via train for nothing. The slopes are directly next to the station, too.
Rob Owen

October 24th 2026, 12:49 pm

Blind date: ‘We overstayed our welcome – the waiters were shaking the cutlery drawer really loudly’

Life and style | The Guardian

Alexandrea, 32, a lawyer, meets Pardis, 32, a doctor

October 24th 2026, 12:49 pm

Experience: I’ve climbed Mount Everest 20 times

Life and style | The Guardian

In 1996 doctors told me I wouldn’t walk again unaided, but in 2022 I took the record for the most Everest summits by a non-Sherpa

I grew up in Slough, Berkshire, in a bungalow beside a farm. My father was a scout leader, and I was always outside, building dams and dens, sleeping out and hiding in trees. In my teens, family holidays were two weeks in Wales. At home, nature was my playground.

When I was 17, a school friend took me to a climbing wall where he was a regular. I loved the physicality of it and trying to work out where to put my hands and feet next. We would go there twice a week. In sixth form, we headed to the south coast in Dorset for my first real climbing outing. The waves were crashing and it felt scary and exhilarating. I thought it was magical.

October 24th 2026, 12:49 pm

Tim Dowling: why did I buy an electric car? Because I wanted a medal

Life and style | The Guardian

Lunch with my agent is going nowhere, so I decide to share my latest motoring anecdote

I’m having lunch with my agent – an infrequent occurrence, because neither of us ever has any good news for the other. This lunch is no different.

“Sorry to make you come all this way,” she says, “but I had to be near the office today.” She hints at some complex contractual negotiations involving an author for whom, I suspect, she always has good news.

October 24th 2026, 12:49 pm

No unions, low taxes: why some of Britain’s top chefs are opening outposts in Gulf states

Life and style | The Guardian

Leading restaurateur says Gulf countries actively help businesses set up, while east Asia has a better work ethic

Some of London’s top restaurants are opening branches in Dubai because of a “tax tsunami” in the UK and better work ethic abroad, according to a leading restaurateur.

James Robson, a co-owner of Fallow in St James’s Market, regarded as the capital’s hottest restaurant, serving 1,000 people a day, has just signed a deal to open an outpost in the Gulf.

October 24th 2026, 12:49 pm

Systolic style: meet the medical-grade smartwatch revolutionising blood pressure monitoring

Life and style | The Guardian

An estimated one-third of adults in England have high blood pressure, with research showing that many are unaware of their condition. But thanks to the new Huawei Watch D3, monitoring blood pressure is easier, accurate and more stylish than ever

Wearable technology has come a long way in the past decade. Take a look around at your colleagues, friends and family, and you’ll be hard pushed to find anyone not wearing some kind of health monitoring ring, watch or band – there are even tracking insoles and patches, too.

These gadgets have myriad benefits – not least, allowing us more control and insight over our health and wellbeing than ever before. We’re able to monitor everything from sleep and stress to heart health and more, and the technology is becoming more refined and intuitive seemingly by the day.

October 24th 2026, 12:49 pm

Caroline Hirons: ‘My celebrity crush? Colin Farrell. I hope he reads this – I hear he likes an older

Life and style | The Guardian

The beauty entrepreneur on why she wears three wedding rings, her fear of running out of HRT, and what put her off being a midwife

Born in Liverpool, Caroline Hirons, 57, moved to London at 17. In 1997, she joined the Aveda counter in Harvey Nichols and went on to train as an aesthetician. She started a blog in 2010 and, 10 years later, published her first book, which won the nonfiction lifestyle prize at the British Book Awards in 2021. In 2022, she launched the Skin Rocks app and skincare line. Her new book is Skin Rules: Expert Advice That You Can Trust. She is separated with four children, and lives in London.

What is the trait you most deplore in yourself?
I can be a tad impatient, and my team would say that’s an understatement.

October 24th 2026, 12:49 pm

Andy Burnham has come for the headphone-dodgers. But is there any evidence fines work?

Life and style | The Guardian

UK leaders past and present love to nudge us towards good or bad behaviour. Social scientists, though, say £100 on-the-spot fines may not prove an effective deterrent

It’s a very modern phenomenon, the nuisance of people on public transport using their phones for flagrantly loud things – conference calls, TV shows, music – without headphones. I remember a time when the most annoying thing you could do with a phone was play a game with an irritating beep; a time when having a loud conversation was so verboten that comedians could get whole careers out of it. So why does Andy Burnham’s campaign, “Share the carriage, not the noise,” introducing fines of up to £100 for miscreants, feel so nostalgic? And crucially, will the fines work?

Burnham is on to something, because it is insufferable. I could lose hours debating the finer points of whether it’s worse to listen to an episode of Paw Patrol, a crux point in a Pretty Little Liars plot, some really mid-80s disco or a high-level discussion about marketing strategy. (In fact, there is no hierarchy; they’re all intolerable in their own special ways.)

October 24th 2026, 12:49 pm

My partner’s obnoxious conduct at our sons’ football matches is putting me off him | Annalisa Barbie

Life and style | The Guardian

His behaviour is certainly inappropriate, but take a quiet moment to try to find out where the anger is coming from

My partner and I have been together for 25 years and we have two sons, aged 14 and 16. Both are football crazy and have played since they were very young. My partner’s competitive nature was one of the things I initially found attractive about him (I wanted someone with drive).

However, this side of him rears its ugly head when our kids play matches. He shouts, criticises and, worst of all, swears at teenagers. I’m so embarrassed by it and it’s also affecting the boys. Their teammates hear their dad and it’s creating tension. I’ve tried to speak to him about it but he brushes it off. Our boys and the coaches have spoken to him too, but to no avail.

October 12th 2026, 3:01 am

‘Ideas need space to breathe’: how Liv Little protects her creativity

Life and style | The Guardian

The novelist, screenwriter and founder of gal-dem on slowing down, shutting out distractions and finding the conditions in which her best ideas can grow

Liv Little, 32, is a novelist, podcaster and screenwriter. In 2015, while at university in Bristol, she founded the online magazine gal-dem, for women and non-binary people of colour, eventually stepping back from the project to focus on her own writing. Her 2024 debut novel, Rosewater, was shortlisted for the Nota Bene Prize. Here, she discusses her creative practice – and how using a reMarkable paper tablet has helped to unlock her imagination.

There are so many ways to be distracted from creative work. I have to be very strong not to keep looking at emails and texts. Although I have gotten better at it over the years. What I like about the reMarkable Paper Pure is that, while it is technology of course, I call it “benevolent technology” because it’s completely – and refreshingly – free from notifications.

‘Whenever I start a project I have to be in nature’

October 12th 2026, 3:01 am

The moment I knew: We were babysitting my younger siblings and he wore a tutu to make them laugh

Life and style | The Guardian

When Sarah Maloney’s primary school crush danced back into her life, she braced for a ‘teenage whirlwind romance’. Then one night, she realised they were both all in

• Find more stories from the moment I knew series

In 2017 I was 16, went to an all-girls Catholic school in Melbourne and had zero tolerance for teenage boys and their nonsense. Instead I spent a lot of gossip time lamenting Jake, who broke my tiny heart in primary school and then moved hours away.

A debutante ball was coming up. It was an expensive tradition that was fundamentally at odds with my values but I couldn’t say no to a pretty dress and dancing – I was a teenage girl, after all. Some friends asked cousins or co-workers from our part-time jobs to be partners. I got knocked back by everyone. When I complained to my mother, she let me know Jake had moved back to town, and did she want me to ask his mum if he would be willing?

October 12th 2026, 3:01 am

This is how we do it: ‘At our age we get to wake up and say: What are we doing today? Let’s make lov

Life and style | The Guardian

A sex podcast opened up a whole new way of communicating for Helen and Ian

• How do you do it? Share the story of your sex life, anonymously

I’ve discovered I like to be spanked – my orgasms have become much stronger

October 12th 2026, 3:01 am

The kindness of strangers: In one of my darkest periods, a few compassionate words helped turn my li

Life and style | The Guardian

I was standing at the traffic lights with the weight of the world on my shoulders when a man approached. He will probably never know the impact he had on my life

• Read more in the kindness of strangers series

My cousin had recently died in a terrible accident and I had been the one who had to identify the body. It was one of the darkest periods of my life, on seemingly every front: I was in the midst of a divorce; it was during the global financial crisis and the company I worked for was badly struggling, making every day feel heavy with uncertainty and stress. Everything was a mess and I was emotionally exhausted.

One morning during rush hour, I stood at the traffic lights waiting to cross on my way to the office. I was lost in my thoughts but must have looked like I had the weight of the world on my shoulders, because something unexpected happened.

October 12th 2026, 3:01 am

Indian Cafe Racer, Birmingham B5: ‘A good news tale for the local food scene’ – restaurant review

Life and style | The Guardian

The cooking is sometimes bang on, sometimes a little slapdash, but then piques your interest all over again

Indian Cafe Racer on Bristol Street, Birmingham, spent its fledgling years tucked behind a curtain at the back of the Wellington pub just a few doors up from its fancy new home. There was a Royal Enfield motorcycle, chequerboard floors and a psychedelic Indian soundtrack, but this small, homespun spot from Azad Kayes quickly became culty, then oversubscribed, then in need of a bigger home. It’s a good news tale for the Brum food scene.

For those who remember it, south Birmingham’s Balti triangle once ran to 30 bustling restaurants along Ladypool Road and Stratford Road. Only two now remain. Something has gone amiss with supply and demand. Indian Cafe Racer, meanwhile, has enough fans for a new, 65-cover, grown-up restaurant, serving an ever-changing menu that, when we visited, featured shaktiman and salad (named after an Indian comic-book superhero), gol gappa (crisp shells filled with chickpeas and potato), chicken pepper fry and grilled aubergine and portobello mushrooms, known as farzi steak.

October 12th 2026, 3:01 am

Dining across the divide: ‘He says net zero is a waste of money as we’ll hit 3C anyway. I think that

Life and style | The Guardian

An English teacher and a personal trainer disagreed on emissions targets, but how did they fare on public spending and defence?

• Want to meet someone from across the divide? Click here to find out how

Edward, 38, Bristol

Occupation English teacher at a secondary school

October 12th 2026, 3:01 am

Readers reply: Why are national anthems almost always orchestral?

Life and style | The Guardian

The long-running series in which readers answer other readers’ questions on subjects ranging from trivial flights of fancy to profound scientific and philosophical concepts

• This week’s question: Why is a child saying ‘Na-na, na-na-na!’ so annoying?

Why are national anthems almost always orchestral? When – and by whom – was it decided that brass and strings best represent a country’s identity? Where are the power-pop or folk varieties? Ross Gomes, by email

Send new questions to nq@theguardian.com.

October 12th 2026, 3:01 am

Just the tonic: curated treasures and English wines on a rail escape to Rye and St Leonards-on-Sea

Life and style | The Guardian

One writer finds his mind changed by a restorative trip along the Sussex coast

People have been telling me for years that the pretty little town of Rye in East Sussex is the new Margate. They’ve been saying it for so long, in fact, that they’ve now started insisting St Leonards-on-Sea – a little farther along the train line, right on the coast – is the new Rye. It’s true that both places, like Margate before them, have enjoyed a boom in culture and coffee shops, in artists and artisanal food stores, becoming enclaves of creativity and cafes. I’ve always brushed off these evangelists, scarred by the boredom of growing up farther along the Sussex coast in Worthing in the 1990s. Yet since then, I’ve heard that the area has become destination-worthy, and I’m keen to finally rediscover it through adult eyes.

Primarily because I recently stumbled across the interiors and fashion store Sunless Antiques on Instagram. A beautifully judged mix of mid-century wooden furniture and vintage workwear, it looked like the sort of spot that only owners with a brilliant eye could curate. And it was in St Leonards. Suddenly it seemed I really ought to investigate, especially as I can travel there directly from London with Southern Railway. As I’m nearby, why not stop off in Rye, too?

October 7th 2026, 4:17 am

How I Shop with Jonathan Van Ness: ‘The price you pay for impulsivity is years later’

Life and style | The Guardian

Always wondered what everyday stuff celebrities buy, where they shop for food and the basics they scrimp on? The Queer Eye legend talks handmade gifts, secondhand shopping and bag obsessions with the Filter

• Don’t get the Filter delivered to your inbox? Sign up here

Jonathan Van Ness rose to fame as the beauty and hair care expert on the multi-award-winning show Queer Eye. Their eight-year tenure as one of the “Fab Five” presenters ended when the show’s final season aired in January 2026. A hairstylist by trade, they have their own cruelty-free, vegan haircare brand, JVN Hair.

Beyond TV and beauty work, Van Ness has continued a career as a comedian, writer and podcast presenter. They have written five books, including the New York Times bestselling memoir Over the Top and their latest young adult novel, which they wrote alongside Julie Murphy, Let Them Stare. Van Ness continues to be an advocate for the LGBTQIA+ community, working on campaigns with The Trevor Project and Planned Parenthood.

October 7th 2026, 4:17 am

‘We live in grief-phobic societies’: experts on how to get more comfortable with death

Life and style | The Guardian

We are all going to die, and so is everyone we know. So how can you not be terrified?

For most people, death is not a standard conversation topic. Once, at lunch, a friend began talking about her mother’s death several years earlier. Her voice caught occasionally, but she spoke about it plainly – like a simple fact of life. As we talked, I noticed another friend was shifting uncomfortably in his seat; he didn’t say much.

Afterwards, I asked him what was wrong. “I really don’t like talking about death,” he said, his hands twitching anxiously. “I don’t even like thinking about it. It freaks me out.”

October 7th 2026, 4:17 am

Roast chicken, congee and cookies: Ravinder Bhogal’s autumn squash recipes

Life and style | The Guardian

Nutty in flavour and creamy in texture, autumn’s bounty of squash and pumpkin has many uses, both sweet and savoury

The shops are heaving with pumpkins and squash, and though there are so many different varieties to choose from, most of them are interchangeable. My favourites are kabocha, crown prince and delicata, for their deeply nutty flavour and creamy texture, plus they hold their shape well when roasted or braised. And if you’re carving a pumpkin for Halloween over the coming weeks, don’t waste the flesh: chop it up and throw into a risotto. It’s hard to imagine that such deliciousness could come from such a ghoulish grimace.

October 7th 2026, 4:17 am

The pest I’ll never forget: the cockroaches I still dream about

Life and style | The Guardian

My student house in Manchester had several thousand other occupants. Despite pest controllers regularly dousing the property, the glossy, greasy, relentless insects marched onwards, endlessly reproducing

‘You do know about the cockroaches?” I’ve forgotten most things people said to me in the 80s, but never that. It was said by one of the occupants of the student house in Longsight, Manchester, that I had signed up to live in the following year. When the landlord had shown me and my future housemates the property, the tenants had been out. He told us they were third years doing their finals and must not be disturbed under any circumstances. (What can I say? We were gullible back then.) Days before summer term ended though, I’d knocked on the door to show a friend where I’d be living. Instead, I learned that the house was infested.

The weird thing is, we moved in anyway. In truth, although I understood this was very bad news, I didn’t quite realise what a cockroach was. There was no internet, so I would have had to go to a library to know what I know now: their march, their canter, their crunch if you step on one. Their soft, sweet, sour smell (uric acid which they store in their fat, apparently). Sometimes, in the back of a shop, or a restaurant loo, I catch that scent and I know what it is.

October 7th 2026, 4:17 am

The butter boom – how the world fell back in love with the glorious golden spread

Life and style | The Guardian

It’s being sculpted for fashion parties, collected by tourists and hoarded in freezers. There are even entire shops devoted to it. What’s behind the revival of the much-maligned foodstuff?

Temperatures in Paris were nudging 41C when Erwan Leo opened Le Butter this summer. Wildfires had already been tearing through France and the city was quiet, particularly in the less touristy 8th arrondissement, a flex-your-wealth area near the Eiffel Tower known as the “golden triangle”. The last thing it needed, you would think, was a shop that sold loads of butter. “We were just so worried about the fridges,” says Leo, the 34-year-old owner. “We didn’t think anyone would even turn up.”

I visit Le Butter, the first shop in Paris dedicated to selling the stuff, two months later in September. It’s a quaint, photogenic spot between a wine shop that was opened by Leo eight years ago and a cafe famous for being blown up in Christopher Nolan’s Inception. Inside there are candy-striped walls, little shopping baskets, a shelf of Instagrammable buttery merch (knives, hats, totes) and two double fridges containing 50 different types of butter. It’s a lot cooler today; the fridges purr away at an exacting 3C. And the past few months have been busy – so much so that Leo has had to erect a bench for those waiting outside, and a retractable barrier to manage the queues.

October 7th 2026, 4:17 am

A moment that changed me: I was heading for disaster on the Greek version of Strictly. Then instinct

Life and style | The Guardian

I was gripped by fear, aching all over – and still recovering from cancer treatment. But Dancing With the Stars was a joyous celebration of survival

It was an invitation I accepted in a moment of madness – and, over the next three months, regretted many times a day. I was in over my head, often with my heels literally over my head: I’d signed up to appear on the Greek version of Strictly Come Dancing.

Dancing With the Stars, as it is called in Greece, follows the same format as its UK counterpart, with an identical studio, a matching shiny floor, even many of the same costumes that are hired out and circulated among the 70 or more international versions of the BBC show. Of course, it’s all in Greek – and in the season I took part in, Covid restrictions had been imposed, which intensified its strangeness.

October 7th 2026, 4:17 am

‘It’s hard to imagine the fires of July’: a bike ride through the Cairngorms in Scotland

Life and style | The Guardian

Wildfires raged through the national park this summer, but much of the landscape remains untouched – and autumn is the perfect time to go

In the Cairngorms national park, the bracken is changing from dark green to russet and umber. Birch leaves are lined with gold, while the Scots pines remain proudly green. Autumn is arriving with a little sigh of relief here, after a summer few will forget.

The wildfire that began near Glenmore and Abernethy on 15 July burned more than 33 sq km (13 sq miles) of moorland and forest. More than 500 firefighters were involved; homes and businesses were evacuated; and the emergency response lasted over a month. Visiting now, it’s hard to see, or even imagine, the damage. Much of the burned area is high on the hill and far from the roads. It’s a huge loss but, in a national park stretching 4,528 sq km (1,748 sq miles), surprisingly easy to miss.

October 7th 2026, 4:17 am

The best ice-cream makers in the UK for gelato, soft serve and sorbets – tested

Life and style | The Guardian

Our writer spent the hottest weeks of the year churning through the top ice-cream makers, from compressor models to the cult favourite Ninja Creami. Here’s the scoop

• Kitchen gadgets top chefs can’t live without
• Ninja Creami Scoop and Swirl ice-cream maker review

I love a scoop or two of the good stuff, even more so when the mercury hits 30C and ice-cream starts feeling less like an indulgence and more like an essential survival tool. This is why owning an ice-cream maker has always made sense to me. I’ve been using the original Ninja Creami for years now, but before that I was spending a small fortune on gelato, fruity sorbets, frozen yoghurt and other such desserts from the frozen aisle.

Some might argue that the best ice-cream makers are a luxury, but if you’re a true dessert devotee, I believe they can earn their keep in no time. A tub of Häagen-Dazs will set you back almost £6 nowadays, which is an expensive habit if you’re getting through a pot a week during the hottest months of the year.

September 16th 2026, 11:14 am

Jess Cartner-Morley on fashion: pair a little skirt with a chunky jumper for the perfect balancing a

Life and style | The Guardian

Let your legs enjoy the last of the summer’s breeze while a thick top or jacket keeps away the autumn chill

This is the most enjoyable time of the year to get dressed because clothes can just be clothes. They don’t have to function as a personal air-conditioning and sweat-disguising system, as they did for the summer, nor do they need to double as a portable central heating unit yet. Your outfit does not need to “take you from day to night” until party season starts, and it doesn’t have to jigsaw itself into a hand-luggage-sized capsule wardrobe until next summer. There is little in the way of functional heavy lifting, so you get to just wear nice clothes.

And this benign early part of autumn is more fun to dress for than the equivalent weather in spring, because we still have a bit of summer swagger. The summer habit of wearing shorts and halter tops and even swimwear has gotten us a little loose, a little more laid-back about flashing a bit of skin here or there. It is about more than bare flesh, though. There is something about summer that flexes the flashy dresser in everyone – whether that’s fancy dress for a festival, or just the way that putting on a pair of sunglasses brings out your inner movie star.

September 16th 2026, 11:14 am

How to turn excess olive brine into a lipsmacking salad dressing – recipe

Life and style | The Guardian

The liquid from a jar of olives is naturally chock-full of savoury flavour, so why should it go to waste? It’s perfect for sprucing up a salad

Olive brine is a simple byproduct that has so much flavour, and it elevates a classic salade nicoise dressing while keeping things colourful, elegant and relatively simple.

September 16th 2026, 10:32 am

Be specific with your listing, embrace your niche: expert Vinted sellers share their tips

Life and style | The Guardian

With Vinted fast becoming the place to sell and buy home goods as well as clothing, discover how you can get started with these pointers from some in-the-know sellers

Eleanor knew Vinted was a great place for buying clothes, but a recent discovery has her raving about something else.

“ My ankles have been really hurting. I needed to stretch my calves, but the device I found to help cost £60 online, so I’d been putting off buying it. Then I suddenly thought: ‘Gosh, I wonder if they have them on Vinted.’”

September 16th 2026, 6:04 am

Sali Hughes on beauty: lip gloss is back in vogue and these new formulas have me hooked

Life and style | The Guardian

Personally, I’ve never been a fan of painting on the gloss, but thanks to a range of fresh formats in sophisticated shades and textures, my head – and lips – have been turned

I’m deeply suspicious of people who never change their minds. To be so completely sure of anything as to be permanently entrenched in any position isn’t something I admire, which is why I shove an olive into my mouth every couple of years and hope it finally takes.

I do the same with lip gloss, with historically similar results. Fashion has, until recently, been on my side. Less sophisticated than lipstick, overshadowed by TikTok trending lip oils, less effortless cool-girl than tinted lip balm, gloss has barely had a look-in these past few years, but new formulas steal from other formats for a better user experience and, well, like everything eventually, lip gloss is back in vogue.

September 16th 2026, 6:04 am

Bridesmaid proposals: a sweet gesture – or another way to make weddings ludicrously expensive?

Life and style | The Guardian

Being a bridesmaid is a big commitment. Now, asking prospective candidates is becoming an event in itself, sometimes with a heavy price tag

Name: Bridesmaid proposals.

Age: Relatively new.

September 16th 2026, 4:17 am

Fast, furious and potentially fatal: why are supercars suddenly so popular?

Life and style | The Guardian

Once the preserve of the ultra-rich, supercars are finding new drivers through rentals, finance deals, influencer culture and the manosphere. But why would anyone want a 200mph vehicle?

‘The £600,000 Lamborghini; that was the first seizure of the operation,” says special chief inspector Geoff Tatman of the Metropolitan police, thinking back to the second weekend of August. “He was stopping at the red lights, revving his engine, waiting for the traffic to clear, then speeding. So on the third time we saw him do it, we stopped him and seized the vehicle.” The car has a top speed of 217mph (350kmh), but the limit on these London streets is 20mph. Over the same weekend, the Metropolitan police seized about 90 more cars with a combined value of more than £8m, an increase on last year’s tally of 72 cars. They were seized for various offences: driving without insurance, driving with incorrect licences or antisocial behaviour. Previously, the Met would have had to let such drivers off with a warning, but the law – section 59 of the Police Reform Act – was strengthened this year to enable the immediate confiscation of vehicles. The seized cars also included a Ferrari Monza worth about £3.4m (the driver only had a provisional UK licence). They were all put on display at Marble Arch, attracting a throng of camera-wielding onlookers (one attender did a seven-hour live blog of the occasion).

Many of the supercars apprehended by the Met in August bore Middle Eastern number plates. It has been a growing trend for car owners from the region to spend summer in London, bringing their cars with them (at a cost of £25,000 upwards). The orange Lamborghini that Tatman seized had Dubai plates. Most of the vehicle owners retrieved their cars the next day after paying fines and presenting the correct paperwork. The Lamborghini driver was subsequently seen driving respectfully and not revving his engine. Lessons were learned, although the question remains: why ship a 200mph car to London to drive in a 20mph zone?

September 16th 2026, 4:17 am

A moment that changed me: I felt hugely self conscious about my skin - until I had a revelation

Life and style | The Guardian

For years, my vitiligo controlled my life, and I was constantly trying to disguise it. But one day, I realised I could take a very different and extremely liberating approach

The microphone felt heavier than I expected. As I stood on stage at a London comedy club last December, I looked out at a room full of strangers sitting quietly, waiting for me to make them laugh. It felt nerve-racking and surreal. I had spent years hiding my vitiligo, hoping people wouldn’t notice it. Now I was about to joke about it in my set.

I was three years old when I developed my first patch of vitiligo on the back of my hand, which later spread to my arms, legs, face and other parts of my body. By the time I was six years old, 70% of me was covered. I was too young to understand what was happening.

September 16th 2026, 4:17 am

Squid ink tomato pasta and honey and fig semifreddo: Chris Leach’s Italian recipes for the end of su

Life and style | The Guardian

Cooking at this time of year is all about low-effort, maximum-impact options. This savoury dish comes together quickly but looks striking, while the dessert showcases figs at their most flavoursome

The secret to late-summer/early autumn cooking is to keep things relatively low-effort, not least to assuage those back-to-work/school blues. And that rule applies across the board, whether you’re making a midweek meal, entertaining or serving up a long, slow Sunday lunch. The sauce for this pasta dish, for example, comes together while the pasta is cooking, while the semifreddo pudding makes the most of ripe figs when they are at their absolute best.

September 16th 2026, 4:17 am

The girl with a will to live: the love, hope and pain of raising Elsie – my one in 163 million daugh

Life and style | The Guardian

She was born with an ultra-rare genetic disorder. After my decades working in film PR, I now face the biggest campaign of all: the fight for her life

My daughter Elsie has beautiful curls – blond like a little Botticelli cherub’s, hair that someone dark like me could only ever dream of. She laughs a lot, has a cheeky sense of humour and soaks in all the sounds around her – rustling leaves, the sea, a dog barking, children playing around a pool, me impersonating the alarm clock every morning, me impersonating monkeys. Indeed, me impersonating any animal.

Sound is important for Elsie because she has a visual impairment and, while we know she has some peripheral vision, is legally classed as blind. As a result, she uses her tongue to check her environment. When she’s excited it sticks out, tasting the air around her, licking anyone close, sensing space. And when she likes the taste of something she keeps her tongue out until you give her more. This is how we know she likes lollies.

September 16th 2026, 4:17 am

The other side of Croatia: ‘a landscape that could out-Tuscany Tuscany’

Life and style | The Guardian

Weekenders from Zagreb head to the rolling green Samobor Hills for nature, vineyards, delicious local food and Habsburg-era architecture

‘You’re going to Samobor? You must try kremšnita,” my Dubrovnik friends told me before I set off on my trip north. “But I’ve already had kremšnita in Zagreb,” I told them. They do it better in Samobor, they insisted. I wasn’t about to get embroiled in a battle of the cream cakes in a region where Croatians, Slovenes and Austrians all like to celebrate their own versions of this decadently thick, fat custard slice topped with puff pastry and icing sugar. But I was more than willing – happy, even – to follow everyone’s suggestions to try kremšnita in Hotel Livadić’s Kavana Livadić, in Samobor’s main King Tomislav Square, a mere half-hour drive west of Zagreb.

It lived up to the hype – delicately rich, creamy and with a light touch. After spending a few weeks in sun-bleached Venetian Dalmatia, amid the scrubby, limestone Dinaric Alps, I had swapped empires and was firmly in Habsburg Croatia. Here, in Zagreb County’s prettiest town, handsome baroque houses in pastel shades of buttery yellow, apricot and pistachio, festooned with stucco, line narrow King Tomislav Square, whose umbrella-shaded cafe terraces were filled with Croatians getting their morning fix of coffee and chatter.

September 16th 2026, 4:17 am

Barclaycard sent me a bill for someone else’s account

Life and style | The Guardian

It told me a year ago I had applied for a credit card – now it is it telling me my payment is overdue

A year ago I got an email from Barclaycard stating that my “application was successful” for a credit card. I had made no such application. I immediately reported this to Barclaycard. More emails arrived and I made repeated phone calls to customer service.

I was assured it was a simple typo rather than fraud, and that my email address would be removed. However, I’m now receiving notifications that the latest account payment is overdue.

September 16th 2026, 4:17 am

Can you freeze leftover risotto? | Kitchen aide

Life and style | The Guardian

It’s probably not a good idea to freeze cooked risotto rice, but if you must, we have three experts who can tell you how to minimise the mush

I have tried various ways to reheat risotto after freezing, but it always turns into a gloopy, starchy, unappetising mess. What am I doing wrong?
Jill, by email
“Freezing risotto will be a bit of a disaster,” says Theo Randall, chef/patron at Theo Randall Cucina Italiana at the Intercontinental in London, “and it doesn’t really work.” The reason for this is that the cooked rice absorbs all the moisture while it’s defrosting, resulting in, well, Jill’s gloopy mess.

It’s also possible her risotto was overcooked to begin with, says Sue Quinn, author of Cheese Please. “Softer grains mean more leached starch, which leaves less leeway for further cooking without it going sticky and pasty.” Then there’s the question of reheating that defrosted rice for too long: “That can over-soften the already-cooked rice,” adds Quinn, so you have to do it “quickly and only until it’s piping hot”.

The reality, however, is that “freezing, thawing and reheating rice will make it squishier whatever you do”, Quinn says, but “if that’s the way Jill rolls”, her best bet is to get that defrosted risotto in the microwave, sprinkle it with a little water or stock, cover loosely, then reheat on high in one-minute intervals, stirring in between, until it’s hot all the way through. “To do this on the hob, put the defrosted risotto in a pan with a splash of hot stock or water, and stir gently over a medium heat for just long enough to distribute the heat.”

Got a culinary dilemma? Email feast@theguardian.com

September 15th 2026, 8:44 am

Double cleansing: should we really be cleaning ourselves twice in each shower?

Life and style | The Guardian

This idea has suddenly gained huge popularity online. But is it just a way to sell us more products – and could it potentially damage our skin?

Gone are the days of the speedy shower; a quick lather with a squirt of shower gel will, apparently, no longer cut it. Double cleansing – once the remit of facial skincare and shampoo routines – has steadily trickled into body-care, too. But should you simply stock up on twice as much shower gel? Is it any more hygienic? And how clean do we really need to be?

As always, TikTok – or rather, #ShowerTok – has a huge number of devotees to this new trend. “Double cleansing will change your life,” says self-care advocate Xara Beqele (@xarabeq) in a video that has almost 10,000 likes. “I think double cleansing is the most effective thing I have added for my shower. I just smell better, feel clean.” Likewise, digital creator Terree Ann (@terreetaughtme) calls double cleansing the body a “hygiene must”. “If you are only washing your body with a hydrating body wash, that’s like washing your body with lotion,” she says in a video that has been shared more than 6,000 times. “If you’re only going in with a scented body wash on top of unclean skin, that’s like spraying Febreze to try to mask the funk instead of properly removing it.” Perhaps it’s no surprise, then, that recent research found gen Zs take longer showers than any other age group – despite being most anxious about the climate crisis.

September 15th 2026, 8:03 am

Houseplant hacks: can pothos help new cuttings to root?

Life and style | The Guardian

The hormone-packed pothos plant might encourage healthy root growth in other cuttings – or it might not. But you’ve nothing to lose by trying

The problem
Propagation can provide never-ending plants, but sometimes you have to wait weeks for something to happen. Anything that speeds up those reluctant rooters is worth knowing about, especially if it’s free.

The hack
According to a popular plant hack, placing a pothos in the same water as other cuttings encourages them to root faster. This is often attributed to pothos releasing auxins – the plant hormones involved in root development – into the shared water.

September 15th 2026, 7:01 am

The pirates arrived with AK-47s. They took us hostage – then the torture began

Life and style | The Guardian

Chirag Bahri was working on board a tanker when six men seized it. For almost eight months, he and his colleagues were held captive, an experience that would change his life for ever

It was at noon on 8 May 2010 when the pirates came. Chirag Bahri remembers the exact time and date because it marked the start of the seven months and 20 days he was held hostage by a gang of Somali pirates. Bahri was 28 at the time, and working as second engineer on a chemical tanker, Marida Marguerite. It was his 12th journey through the Gulf of Aden in the Indian Ocean. It had been a good job for a young man from landlocked Uttar Pradesh in India, and Bahri was about to be promoted. “But then, piracy,” he says.

The ship had been 120 miles off the coast of Oman, partway through a run taking benzene – a raw material used in petrochemicals – from Kandla Port in India to Antwerp in Belgium. The piracy problem in the Indian Ocean was well known; Somalis armed with AK-47s were setting out in fast skiffs and taking ships hostage. Yet commercial vessels, including the Marida Marguerite, remained undefended.

September 15th 2026, 5:45 am

The pest I’ll never forget: the rat who jumped off the wardrobe and flew at my face

Life and style | The Guardian

There was a rat army in my flatshare, gnawing through pipes, carpets and even a bedroom door. That’s not to mention the mice ...

We should have known we were in trouble when we saw that the garden of our new place backed on to a Chinese restaurant in Hackney, London, with terrible reviews. Before long, the rats started coming in through the pipes. It was ratmageddon, and every day it got more harrowing. They trooped over our kitchen, like the world’s worst sequel to Ratatouille. They calmly walked into rooms while we were watching telly. They gnawed through all the carpets to try to get into our bedrooms.

There was no stopping them. After sniffing out the remnants of an old snack in my housemate Simon’s bin, a pack of rats got to work one night gnawing through the wood at the bottom of his bedroom door. Like a rodent military exercise, they spent eight hours whittling a hole large enough to get through. I lay next door, 100% freaked out, panicking they’d try to get into my room next. I didn’t sleep a wink. Fairly soon after this, one of the rats died under the floorboards so we got a bottle-fly infestation to boot. Naturally, our landlord did nothing about any of this.

September 15th 2026, 5:45 am

Solo autumn walks for women in the UK and Europe: ‘it should be fun, not daunting’

Life and style | The Guardian

Hiking alone in the countryside can be joyous, but for women it can sometimes feel unnerving. Here’s how to enjoy it safely, plus four stunning routes to walk solo

I did my first solo hike during a sunny September, seven years ago. After a summer of feeding and ferrying four noisy teenagers (and their friends) around, I was exhausted. But despite being bone tired, I had barely moved. I yearned, above all, for time on my own, for the chance to walk without interruption (and at the pace I chose), and for the silence of some empty wilderness.

But I was nervous. Not of being on my own, but of what might happen to me with no one around to help (breaking a bone, encountering a psychopath, being chased by a bull, getting fatally lost). I could have found a companion or joined a group, but my need for silence and solitude outweighed my fears.

September 15th 2026, 5:45 am

It’s a superfood but natto as we know it. Japan’s slimy fermented beans are coming your way

Life and style | The Guardian

Comprised of smelly soya beans held together by strands of mucus, the ancient dish is appearing in health food shops across the world

It is smelly, slimy and contains bacteria – and a sizeable number of Japanese wouldn’t touch it with a pair of barge pole-length chopsticks. But after centuries as a breakfast food for Japanese diners with nerves of steel, natto is emerging as a global superfood to rival kimchi, kombucha and kefir.

Its exact origins are unknown. Some believe it was introduced to Japan from China by Buddhist monks during the Yayoi period (300BC-AD300), before becoming a staple among rural communities during the Edo period (1603-1868).

September 15th 2026, 5:45 am

Phones are the new cigarettes: why restaurants are discouraging and even banning them

Life and style | The Guardian

Would you hand in your phone at the door in exchange for a free bottle of wine? One restaurateur has tried that – and there are now many other gambits that are encouraging us to connect

Name: Phone bans.

Age: Their provenance is considerable; their time is now.

September 14th 2026, 11:45 am

Autumn vibes, summer temps: six ways to get cosy while it’s still warm

Life and style | The Guardian

Craving cosiness, but too warm for blankets and baths? Try our autumn cheat sheet

• Don’t get the Filter delivered to your inbox? Sign up here

After a record-breaking summer of heat, temperatures aren’t set to drop enough for hot baths, warm tights and roast dinners just yet. But if the darker evenings and falling leaves have got you craving cosiness, here’s our recipe for achieving that comforting autumnal vibe while it’s still unseasonably warm out.

***

September 14th 2026, 11:30 am

Rosie Mackean’s quick and easy recipe for lamb chops with courgettes, walnuts and yoghurt | Quick an

Life and style | The Guardian

Intimidated by the thought of midweek entertaining? Three simple rules make it simple…

Entertaining midweek can feel daunting, but if you employ a couple of tricks, things can very quickly go from mayhem to magic. First, choose a dish that goes perfectly with good bread, so your carb is covered. Second, choose a protein that is quick to cook and great for sharing – little lamb chops are perfect for this, while also being a treat. And, finally, use other ingredients that don’t need much help. Here, the walnuts just get cooked in butter and the lamb juices, the courgettes are simply boiled and dressed, and the yoghurt is, well, yoghurt. Suddenly you’ve conjured up a masterpiece ready for many hands to dig in.

Good Time Cooking: Show-Stopping Menus for Easy Entertaining, by Rosie Mackean, is published by Pavilion Books at £26. To order a copy for £23.40, visit guardianbookshop.com

September 14th 2026, 8:30 am

How to declutter: the dos and don’ts of having a good clear out

Life and style | The Guardian

Parting ways with your old things can be an emotional process. Follow these top tips to simplify your decluttering

Few things in life feel better than a good clear out. Whether you’re decluttering for a practical reason such as moving house, to make some extra cash, or simply to feel calmer and happier in your own home, consider this your sign to stop putting it off and to start to live better with less.

But where should you start? How should you edit? And what should you do with all the stuff you no longer need? Here are the tips and tricks to help you leap into a satisfying spring clean – any time of year.

September 14th 2026, 6:45 am

The one change that worked: I was terrified of the dentist - until I found a very special one

Life and style | The Guardian

After an agonising experience, I avoided checkups for four years. But a practice that assured a stress-free process for scared patients was transformative

I haven’t always been afraid of the dentist. If you had asked me a decade ago whether sitting in the dentist’s chair filled me with dread or made me break out in a cold sweat, I would have laughed and said no – what is there to be afraid of? It was only in 2021, after I had a filling without being properly numbed, that I understood why people are afraid of dental work. Despite telling him I was in excruciating pain, the dentist carried on with the procedure anyway, and I was left with a newfound and deep-seated fear.

At first, this was easily managed. I simply binned the reminders to book checkups, avoided their calls and carried on with my life. After a year, I told myself I’d see the dentist soon – just not yet. I firmly shoved the problem to the back of my mind.

September 14th 2026, 6:45 am

The pet I’ll never forget: Polly, the golden retriever who saved my husband’s life

Life and style | The Guardian

We got her as a puppy and she became particularly close to Adam – a blessing when he went into cardiac arrest in the middle of the night

My husband, Adam, and I had always planned to have a big family and that journey began when we got our dog, Polly, five years ago. I’ve loved golden retrievers since I was a child because I grew up with one. We got Polly as a puppy and she was everything we’d hoped for: loving and smart.

She immediately connected with both of us, but became inseparable from Adam. They would go for morning runs together; Polly could always be found wagging her tail by his side. This bond proved to be lifesaving.

September 14th 2026, 6:45 am

Hot and sour, vegetarian mapo and in spicy sauce: Fuchsia Dunlop’s tofu recipes

Life and style | The Guardian

Wobblesome, firm or silken, tofu is a star ingredient in Chinese cooking. These dishes show why

In the west, tofu is often viewed as a substitute for meat, which may explain why firmer types that can be cut into chunks and fried or grilled like meat have become so ubiquitous. In China, however, where tofu has been eaten for at least 1,000 years, it isn’t a substitute for anything; it’s simply a protein-rich ingredient that forms part of most people’s diets, can be cooked with meat and fish, and comes in myriad forms, from the tender, wobbly tofu used to make Sichuanese mapo tofu to firm smoked tofu, sheets of tofu “skin” and the silken tofu that can be as soft as creme caramel. Many Chinese tofu recipes are so delicious that habitual meat-eaters will devour them as keenly as vegetarians.

September 14th 2026, 4:16 am

From the perfect jeans to wedgie-free knickers: fashion experts’ guide to the best women’s basics

Life and style | The Guardian

Want to know the essentials fashion insiders swear by? Whether it’s great T-shirts or forever trainers, Guardian writers and stylists reveal the pieces they rate

• Jess Cartner-Morley’s September style essentials

Whether it’s a great pair of pants or the perfect T-shirt, nailing the basics can make or break your wardrobe. “They have to work harder than anything else,” says British Vogue style editor Funmi Fetto.

I asked Fetto and other stylists and style writers, along with members of the Guardian fashion desk – who all spend more time than most thinking about this stuff – for their most-loved basics. And don’t worry, most of them won’t break the bank.

September 14th 2026, 4:16 am

Burrata and beyond: a foodie tour of northern Puglia, Italy

Life and style | The Guardian

It’s the birthplace of the popular cheese, but the Barletta-Andria-Trani province in southern Italy has an array of local delicacies – from olive oil and yellow tomatoes to goat prosciutto

‘I don’t eat mozzarella outside Puglia,” says our friend Savio. “It’s not the same.” Savio is a very opinionated foodie, so I take his words with a pinch of good Puglian sea salt (see below). He was adamant about the superiority of the stretched-curd cheese from his home turf.

Puglia is also the birthplace of ingredient du jour burrata, which originated in Andria, a few miles from Savio’s home town of Barletta. Andria forms one part of the triangular Barletta-Andria-Trani (BAT) province, often passed over for better-known parts of Puglia, despite the cheese connection and Barletta having miles of palm-backed, sandy beaches.

September 14th 2026, 4:16 am

Is it true that … having a hot drink will cool you down?

Life and style | The Guardian

A warm cup of tea can trigger sweating and lower your body temperature, but only if you’re in an airy space

Could a warm cup of tea really be the key to cooling down in hot weather? Or is that just something caffeine fiends tell themselves when they’re still working through a pot of coffee as the temperature hits 30C?

Prof John Tregoning, the author of Live Forever? A Curious Scientist’s Guide to Wellness, Ageing and Death, says it depends on the circumstances. He points to the work of Australian scientist Prof Ollie Jay, who is a world leader in researching heat and how it balances out in your body.

September 14th 2026, 4:16 am

The kindness of strangers: On a busy motorway, my child vomited in the car. I was overwhelmed – then

Life and style | The Guardian

My son was inconsolable and the back seat was an absolute mess. After a few minutes of trying to clean up, a stranger emerged from a nearby house

• Read more in the kindness of strangers series

Kids always get sick at the worst possible time. For instance: the middle of a busy motorway, one hour into a three-hour trip.

My husband was away for work and I was driving our two small children to see him, when one vomited in the back seat. I pulled into a slipway just off the motorway to try to clean up as best I could. The kids were too young to be trusted to sit there safely right next to a busy road, so I had to leave them strapped into the car seats while I tried to mop up the vomit with wet wipes. My son was inconsolable and the car was an absolute mess.

September 13th 2026, 5:00 pm

‘But enough about you …’ How to survive in a world of monologuists, interrupters and trauma dumpers

Life and style | The Guardian

Conversations are supposed to be two-sided – but all too often we come up against someone who’s passionately, exclusively in love with the sound of their own voice. Time to fight back …

When I was in my early teens, I was often invited round to a schoolfriend’s house for dinner. Her family struck me as wildly progressive: they were Danish and indulged in all sorts of “out-there” activities – fondues, candle-making and, most terrifying of all, the talking stick.

Before the meal was served, someone would retrieve the sacred broom handle and it would be passed around the table. You could speak only if you had possession of the stick. Despite it being the most stressful thing ever (it meant being in the spotlight, and then remembering to keep quiet the rest of the time), I now frequently yearn for a more convenient version of that stick.

For example, I met a friend recently who I see infrequently but keep up with via voice notes. No sooner had we sat down than he launched into a long discourse about his new marathon training food plan. He only broke the flow to order an omelette: “Four egg whites, two yolks, is that possible?” (We were in my local greasy spoon, so the request was greeted with mirth.) When we left, 90 minutes later, he finally had the grace to turn to me and ask: “And how are things with you?”

Walking home, I felt a mixture of disappointment and irritation. Had he always been so self-absorbed? So uninterested in anyone else? I couldn’t help wondering if our one-sided virtual updates had played a part in the problem.

There is a name for this type of egocentric behaviour – “conversational narcissism”. Although it was coined by the sociologist Charles Derber in his 1979 book The Pursuit of Attention, the term seems more relevant than ever. “WhatsApp communication and voice notes are really a series of monologues,” says Charlotte Fox Weber, a psychotherapist. “In face-to-face situations, people are forgetting how to pause naturally, to make space to hear and listen. And people are chatting on the phone – an activity that at least requires turn-taking in a defined way – much less often.”

A lot of our communication online can feel weirdly transactional, focused on logistics or niche WhatsApp groups. According to Tamu Thomas, a life coach and author, this has damaged the art of improvised conversation. “People have less capacity for meandering conversations that don’t have a purpose,” she says. “A good dialogue is a back-and-forth between two people discovering new things about each other, even if they have known each other for years. Because there are now so many different channels available to stay in touch, some people are confusing communication with connection.”

Knowledge is power, though. If you can recognise the five types of common conversation hogger, it will be much easier to handle them.

September 13th 2026, 5:00 pm

Plan your parking, don’t rush at night and never panic – 15 expert tips to become a better driver

Life and style | The Guardian

No matter how long you’ve had your licence, there’s always scope to improve your skills behind the wheel. Driving instructors share their tips on how to be a better motorist

Whether you have just passed your test or been behind the wheel for decades, driving skills can always be sharpened up. From dealing with road rage to traffic jams, tight parking spaces to hire cars, driving instructors share their tips on how to be a better motorist in the most challenging scenarios.

September 13th 2026, 5:00 pm

Dining across the divide: ‘The young have so much idealism – but for him everything was determined b

Life and style | The Guardian

A Tory twentysomething and a lifelong leftwinger agreed on the need for more housing stock, but did they concur on welfare and net zero?

• Want to meet someone from across the divide? Click here to find out how

Oliver, 22, London

Occupation Journalist for ConservativeHome

September 13th 2026, 8:30 am

This is how we do it: ‘Being in an open relationship means we’re constantly choosing each other’

Life and style | The Guardian

Michael and Selena have three young kids and practise ethical non-monogamy which helps energise their relationship

• How do you do it? Share the story of your sex life, anonymously

When you come back to your partner, you see the person you fell in love with

September 13th 2026, 8:30 am

A taste of home: discovering Sweden’s local food heroes

Life and style | The Guardian

Chefs in the east of the country are shunning imported produce for local ingredients, reinforcing how food is intertwined with a region and its people

‘It’s a magical place, and not just because of the hotel.” Standing outside the greenhouses at Högbo Brukshotell, two hours north of Stockholm, Stefan Johansson is talking about far more than hospitality. The former head chef, now responsible for sustainability at Högbo, has spent much of the past decade helping reshape the way this corner of Sweden grows, cooks and thinks about food.

The catalyst was disarmingly simple. Years ago, a journalist asked Johansson why he was cooking the food he was cooking. Like many ambitious Swedish chefs, Stefan trained in Stockholm’s top restaurants, where ingredients from around the world were only a phone call away. The question lingered long after the interview ended.

September 13th 2026, 4:29 am

‘Cheap iPhone deal’: warning over scam sites selling latest Apple mobiles

Life and style | The Guardian

Criminals exploit demand for iPhone 18 Pro and foldable Duo to trick people eager to get their hands on one

Apple has just launched a range of new iPhones, including a foldable handset, just as you decide it is time to replace your own ageing mobile. But you balk at the £1,199 price tag for the cheapest of the new options.

Searching online for a better price with the words “cheap”, “iPhone” and “deal”, you come across a website which offers an iPhone 18 Pro for a couple of hundred pounds less than the Apple site. You pay for the new phone via a bank transfer and wait for it to arrive.

September 13th 2026, 4:29 am

Rosina, London SW17: ‘Bella Italia in Bolton this is not’ – restaurant review

Life and style | The Guardian

The weekly linen laundry bills alone must make the accountants weep

Rosina is a serene, heavenly-white neighbourhood Italian restaurant just off Wandsworth Common, on the same stretch as the much-celebrated Chez Bruce. It is Adam Byatt’s fifth place – he’s probably best known for Trinity, his Michelin-starred restaurant up the road in Clapham – and, lately, his very good, recipe-driven YouTube channel ran a Road to Rosina series in which he visits suppliers, eats pasta with nonnas and learns peak tiramisu skills from a woman called Pina (more of her tiramisu later). If any neighbourhood can stomach an achingly civilised, Emilia Romagna-influenced, candlelit trattoria where the cloakroom tags are actual Amalfi Coast pebbles engraved with numbers, it is Wandsworth Common, land of the hedge fund/interior design power couple who wouldn’t think twice about sipping a basil gimlet with a plate of melon with culatello di Zibello or gnocco fritto with mortadella. Bella Italia in Bolton this is not.

Rosina’s cocktail bar leans on art deco shapes, with a pale, marble-topped counter and walls covered in David Steen portraits. There’s a small second bar area for those bridging the gap between light dinner and semi-serious drinking, and a larger, linen-tableclothed area for the restaurant proper, with a back room for private dining. Rosina’s intimacy is an optical illusion: the place is as big as a tennis court, and the weekly linen laundry bills alone must make the accountants weep.

September 13th 2026, 4:29 am

‘I was hit by an emotional hurricane’: Esther Freud, Deborah Levy and other novelists revisit their

Life and style | The Guardian

Even in adulthood, the place where you grew up never really leaves you. Could paying a return visit help six writers understand its power?

September 13th 2026, 3:44 am

I survived a stroke during an ocean swim. Here’s what I’ve learned about fear

Life and style | The Guardian

After his stroke in rough surf, Graham Russell embarked on an unexpected journey into fear. Three lessons helped him return to the joy of the ocean

Looking out over the ocean, I would watch the waves sparkling in the sunlight as they grew and spilled into a burst of froth. It was a fun way to relax, to breathe deep and enjoy an awesome display of energy. But lately it had become exhausting.

In winter last year I tore the lining of an artery in my neck during a rough ocean swim off the Central Coast of New South Wales. It caused a stroke while I was in the water, which saw me scrambling back to shore where a surfer noticed me and sounded the alarm. Six months later, the injury had healed, and my motor functions were all back to normal. But as I prepared for a dip in calm conditions on a sunny day in January, I paused. An unexpected journey into fear began.

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September 13th 2026, 3:44 am

‘Wonderfully rich and nutty’: the best supermarket mature cheddar, tasted and rated

Life and style | The Guardian

These days, there’s a bewildering array of mature cheddar out there, but the good stuff can be hard to find. Which blocks have that tangy farmhouse flavour and which are better left on the supermarket shelf?

• The best vegan cheese, tasted and rated

As a West Country lad from the Somerset borders, I believe cheddar should come from Cheddar. The village boasts England’s largest limestone gorge, at three miles long and almost 400ft deep, and the stable low temperatures, high humidity and unique microbiome of its caves are perfect for maturing this famous cheese.

But good cheddar can be hard to find, not least because it’s a British kitchen staple that’s often sold as a loss-leader and produced by industrial creameries. The resulting generic block of cheese is pleasant enough, but if you want something with a complex flavour profile, crunchy calcium lactate crystals and a creamy texture, you’re going to have to put in some legwork.

September 13th 2026, 3:44 am

My partner’s sister has published a family memoir that's unfair to him. Should we cut ties? | Ask An

Life and style | The Guardian

She should have been much more careful, but everyone has their own version of the ‘truth’. Does your partner want a reconciliation?

My sister-in-law wrote and published an emotionally charged “memoir” of family dislocation and trauma, in which she massaged the truth of her family’s past to portray my partner as emotionally damaged. (In fact, he is empathetic and was beloved by those he worked with.) Theirs was a complex family story, and there were many omissions and mistruths, which she failed to factcheck with us.

She tried to de‑identify her brother, but he would be recognisable to anyone with a rudimentary ability to search the internet. Legal action was considered, but decided against. Who gets to tell a story in these times? Whose story is more “true”? And should we cut off all ties or attempt reconciliation?

September 13th 2026, 3:44 am

Blind date: ‘He probably thinks I hold a lot of strong opinions on frivolous matters’

Life and style | The Guardian

Joe, 27, who works in advocacy at a charity, meets Jade, 29, a PR account manager

What were you hoping for?
Human connection outside an algorithm – good conversation and a fun anecdote.

September 12th 2026, 3:28 am

Kent is having a champagne moment: ‘English wine has gone from a joke to world-class’

Life and style | The Guardian

French champagne house Taittinger is helping produce a premium fizz in the Garden of England – and now visitors can visit the beautiful winery and sample it

The grapes are turning purple on tall green vines, which stretch down towards the distant flint-and-limestone tower of Chilham church. These rows of Pinot Meunier, destined for English sparkling wine, are 51% owned by French champagne house Taittinger. “England is now the most exciting wine region,” says host and sales executive Hilary Sharp as she leads me around Domaine Evremond vineyard, which opened its visitor centre last year to coincide with the launch of its first wine.

In his 2023 book Vines in a Cold Climate, drinks writer Henry Jeffreys charts the rise of English wine “from a joke to world-class in 30 years”. The book opens with an alcohol-fuelled scene of vine-planting at Domaine Evremond in May 2017: unseasonably cold, rainy, muddy, with rambling anecdotes from anglophile Pierre-Emmanuel Taittinger about “English women encountered in his misspent youth”. The vineyard is named for the exiled French aristocrat Charles de Saint-Évremond, a symbol of hedonistic Anglo-French cooperation. The bon vivant introduced champagne to England and party-loving Charles II made him governor of Duck Island in St James’s Park.

September 12th 2026, 3:28 am

The ritual humiliation of putting on a cold, wet wetsuit: the Edith Pritchett cartoon

Life and style | The Guardian

Continue reading...

September 12th 2026, 3:28 am

Tim Dowling: how not to interview eminent scientists – a control freak’s guide

Life and style | The Guardian

It was supposed to be a meeting between a great mind and mine. Instead, I was plunged into darkness and did some swearing

The transition to owning an electric car is in its final phase: our electricity supplier is set to install a smart meter in conjunction with a special tariff that will allow us to charge the car cheaply in the dead of night. After that, all I have to do is live long enough to see a return on my considerable investment.

In the meantime – as sometimes happens in the course of my work – I need to interview some eminent scientists. In my experience eminent scientists are easy to reach – they tend to be attached to academic institutions that readily provide their contact details – and surprisingly willing to spend an hour explaining their work to a moron. But there is always a period – the long interval after I’ve emailed four or five, and before any of them have answered – that I begin to suspect a conspiracy of silence. What is it, I think, about my oily emails that they don’t like?

September 12th 2026, 3:28 am

What is the UK’s heaviest and fastest flying duck? The Saturday quiz

Life and style | The Guardian

From Cheddar Man and the Dead Sea Scrolls to Abbie Hoffman, Kikuchiyo and Peter, test your knowledge with the Saturday quiz

1 Slovenia and Venezuela are the first two countries to lose all their what?
2 Which celebrated rock has 1620 carved on to it?
3 What is the UK’s heaviest and fastest flying duck?
4 Which royal consort was born in the same bedroom as Queen Victoria?
5 Skaldic poetry was written in what language?
6 Which international organisation was dissolved on 19 April 1946?
7 Who has statues in Middlesbrough, Derby and Nottingham?
8 Which irrational number is represented by the Greek letter phi?
What links:
9 Cheddar Man; Dead Sea Scrolls; Altamira and Lascaux art; olm salamander?
10 Ash Dykes; Ed Stafford; Ed Talone; Levison Wood?
11 Bat and Ball; Blackrod; Hall i’ th’ Wood; Whatstandwell?
12 US citizen; Stem master’s degree; two years’ professional experience; pass physical test?
13 Ain’t Misbehavin’; Blueberry Hill; Hound Dog (originally); The Twist; Hypnotize?
14 Maia; Peter; Chris Adams; Kikuchiyo; Abbie Hoffman?
15 Profiles in Courage; Brave New World; The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe?

September 12th 2026, 3:28 am

From ‘Ozempic breath’ to hair loss: sorting the science from the hype about weight loss jabs

Life and style | The Guardian

Do you gain weight once you stop using them? Do they make your face saggy? Can they improve your mental health? Experts explain whether 13 common beliefs about GLP-1s are true or false

FALSE “GLP-1 medications mimic Glucagon-like peptide-1 – one of the hormones involved in appetite regulation. It doesn’t completely suppress hunger, but it is powerful,” says Dr Federica Amati, nutrition lead at Imperial College School of Medicine and author of The Appetite Reset. “The medicine is about 1,000 times stronger than what we naturally produce from our gut,” she explains. As food passes through the gut, cells called L-cells sense the nutrients, which sparks the production of the GLP-1 hormone. Without the drugs, these bursts of GLP-1 production last a few minutes. “It’s a bit like a sparkler. In comparison, the drugs are like a bonfire that roars for a week,” says Amati. Because the GLP-1 hormone stays in your body for longer if you are on the drugs, you feel fuller faster and your appetite gets suppressed, but you will eventually get hungry.

September 11th 2026, 10:58 am

What to wear to Wimbledon: how to ace ‘tenniscore’ at the game’s most prestigious tournament

Life and style | The Guardian

From designer midi dresses to linen suits for men, we give you the lowdown on Wimbledon outfits that will really pop this summer

Tennis has simply always been chic. From the competitors’ crisp whites to the quietly luxe ensembles in the stands, it’s a sport that scores big on style. And when it comes to world-class Wimbledon outfits, there’s one label that never misses: Ralph Lauren.

Beloved since the 1960s for its blend of sports and sartorial flair, Polo Ralph Lauren has been the official outfitter of The Championships, Wimbledon (the proper name, take note) for the past 20 years. Clothing every umpire, ball boys and ball girls and groundsperson at Wimbledon is no mean feat – but as they’re both steeped in heritage and timeless good taste, the all-American brand and the quintessentially British tournament pair as perfectly as strawberries and cream.

September 11th 2026, 10:58 am

I tested 40 lunch boxes – here are the best in the UK for leaks, looks and sustainability

Life and style | The Guardian

Tired of squashed sarnies and spilt dressing? From stainless steel to insulated to plastic-free, here are the lunch boxes for kids and adults we rate the most

• The best water bottles

If packed lunches are a high-stakes game in your household (as they are in mine), the right lunch box is crucial. There’s nothing worse than opening the lunch you’ve been looking forward to since 8am to find yoghurt has leaked on to your sandwich and your cucumbers have dried out.

A lunch box may look like a simple bit of kit, but keeping food contained from kitchen to school dinner hall or workplace desk is a surprisingly demanding job. And the humble lunch box has come a long way from the simple plastic tubs that used to contain our clingfilm-wrapped, squashed sandwiches at school. Today, you can find bento boxes with multiple compartments, stainless steel containers, silicone pouches and leakproof designs promising to keep everything from yoghurt to salad dressing safely contained.

September 11th 2026, 10:58 am

Cocktail of the week: Cometa’s carajillo – recipe | The good mixer

Life and style | The Guardian

The classic Mexican combo of espresso and Licor 43 gets a shot in the arm with a decent hit of cold-brew coffee liqueur

The carajillo is a ubiquitous drink found across Mexico, and it comes in many forms. Some bars simply pour espresso over ice and add a shot of Licor 43, while others shake coffee with the liqueur and serve it straight up. Whatever the variation, the non-negotiables are coffee and Licor 43. Our version takes those two core ingredients and lengthens the drink with a light, delicious cold-brew coffee liqueur. It’s the perfect serve for a warm afternoon, a sweet after-dinner treat or an uplifting nightcap.

Tom King, head bartender, Cometa, London W1

September 11th 2026, 9:29 am

I heard it through the grapevine: everything you need to know about growing grapes

Life and style | The Guardian

Vines are a beautiful addition to an edible garden, yet will only thrive with plenty of light and shelter

My garden faces east-ish and gets a decent amount of sunlight, but it’s fairly exposed and can be cool, so plants that need really warm weather don’t like to grow here. Yet, there’s a corner by the back door that’s a pocket of sun and shelter, and a wise former occupant decided to plant a grapevine there. If I hadn’t inherited this mature grapevine, I can’t imagine I would have thought to plant one, but if you’ve got the right conditions they’re a lovely addition to an edible garden.

First you have to choose whether you want to grow wine grapes or dessert grapes. Wine grapes are smaller and less palatable – but hardier – than dessert grapes, which generally need to be grown in a sturdy greenhouse in order to fully ripen. Grapevines can be sourced from plant sellers and garden centres, and most will have been grafted – so make sure to choose a vine that is best suited to your soil type and local climate.

September 11th 2026, 6:28 am

‘She changed the beauty industry’: how Charlotte Mensah brought black hair into the spotlight

Life and style | The Guardian

A new exhibition in London celebrates the influential hairstylist whose clients include Janelle Monáe and Zadie Smith. She explains her story – and why she’s on a mission to ensure stylists are trained to work with all hair types

When Charlotte Mensah was a young child growing up in Accra, Ghana in the 1970s, she would spend hours watching her aunties having their hair intricately threaded, an ancient African technique where hair is wrapped tightly using yarn or thread. She didn’t know then that she would go on to become one of the most influential hairdressers in the UK. Renowned for championing natural black hair textures in mainstream culture, she has worked as hairstylist to singers Janelle Monáe and Erykah Badu, and the writer Zadie Smith.

According to Smith, in an essay she penned about Mensah’s magic earlier this year: “Charlotte can make a great mane of braids appear where previously there were only split ends and hair loss.”

September 11th 2026, 6:28 am

Want Mr Whippy on tap? I put the viral Ninja Creami Scoop and Swirl ice-cream maker to the test

Life and style | The Guardian

Whether it’s soft serve or sorbet, gelato or fro-yo, the Ninja Creami Scoop and Swirl is a faff-free way of making all your favourite frozen treats

• The best ice-cream makers for your home

For me, ice-cream isn’t only for summer. It’s my dessert of choice all year round, and a good ice-cream maker ensures it’s always readily available. When I put more than a dozen models through their paces earlier this year, one thing became clear: the most important feature in any machine is ease of use.

On that front, the Ninja Creami really scored highly for me. I’ve used the original NC300 model for a few years, and I like its simplicity and that it’s easy to clean. Nowadays, though, we expect our appliances to do a little more – and when it comes to ice-cream, the current craze is soft serve.

September 11th 2026, 5:45 am

Experience: I’ve visited every motorway service station in Britain

Life and style | The Guardian

Some people don’t understand my lifelong enthusiasm for roadside stop-offs – now visiting and cataloguing them is what I do for a living

When I was 10 years old, the highlight of my summer holidays was going to work with my dad, who is a lorry driver. For a couple of years in the mid-2000s, I’d excitedly climb into the cab next to him and we’d set off on a 10-hour trip. My job was to follow the AA Road Atlas, and I’d joyfully track the services marked on the map as we thundered along.

My dad thought stopping was a waste of time, but his designated rest stops were my favourite part of the trip. Depending on the journey, we might stop for two or three meals. I always hoped at least one would be at a Little Chef. I loved their Olympic Breakfast, a massive full English, and every meal was rounded off with a lollipop – what more could a 10-year-old want?

September 11th 2026, 3:13 am

‘I’ve got more of a sense of humour than Ralph Lauren’ – nine things we learned from Paul Smith’s ne

Life and style | The Guardian

He put personality into boxers, collaborated with the pope (sort of) and is to thank for novelty socks. The British designer’s new book reveals there’s more to Smith than his stripes

In July, the British designer Paul Smith celebrated his 80th birthday and he has now released a memoir to mark the occasion. Threads: My Life in Style tells Smith’s story, from growing up in Nottingham and leaving school with no qualifications to selling suits to celebs, including Gary Oldman and David Bowie.

Here are nine of our favourite lesser-known takeaways from the book.

September 11th 2026, 3:13 am

The age of tiramisu: a runaway dessert trend – and what it reveals about nostalgia and decadence

Life and style | The Guardian

The coffee and cream pudding has always been popular. But now it’s inspired a dedicated cafe and countless products, from drinks to ice-creams to buns. What’s behind this big cultural craving?

When Giancarlo Fanigliulo opened Marrone, a cafe dedicated to tiramisu in London’s Soho in August, he hadn’t anticipated he would sell out within two and a half hours. “I was expecting a buzz, but I wasn’t expecting queues around the corner,” he tells me. “It was insane.”

This kind of excitement about the Italian dessert is not a one-off – we are, it seems, living in an age of tiramisu-mania. Nearly all of the high street coffee chains have offered some kind of tiramisu coffee as a seasonal special (in the US, Dunkin’ currently has four different tiramisu-flavoured drinks on its menu). Meanwhile, Haagen-Dazs and Carte D’or now sell tiramisu ice-cream, London chain Buns from Home offers a tiramisu-flavoured croissant-dough bun and social media is awash with tiramisu recipes and videos of “tiramisu drawers” – trays of the dessert ready to serve out of drawers in chefs’ kitchens – as popularised by the viral one at Manchester pasta restaurant Onda.

September 11th 2026, 3:13 am

A scientist said bananas ‘kill’ the benefit of blueberries. Is that true?

Life and style | The Guardian

Can blending these popular fruits in a smoothie adversely affect the berries’ nutritional benefits? Experts weigh in

This year was shaping up to be a banner year for bananas: they were lauded as “2026’s big viral taste”, landed pride of place as Prada’s new lip balm flavor, and were even deemed “the next pumpkin spice”.

But this summer, the Mel Robbins Podcast featured Dr Rhonda Patrick, a biomedical scientist, who said that adding banana to a blueberry smoothie could adversely affect the nutritional benefits of the berries.

September 10th 2026, 1:42 pm

My mother-in-law buys overly girly clothes for my daughter. I try to be gracious but it kills me – d

Life and style | The Guardian

There’s a risk in trying to get our girls away from frilly skirts that we swing all the way to a different kind of enforcement, writes advice columnist Eleanor Gordon-Smith

• Read more Leading questions

I am the mother of a six-year-old girl, and I have relatively progressive views about gender. Among other things, I try to give my daughter a choice of clothes that are practical – T-shirts, leggings – and that tend to be unisex in colour scheme. There are no overly fussy and frilly skirts and dresses in pink and sparkles in her wardrobe. As much as possible, I try to buy non-sweatshop brands. These choices are part of a world system of values I want to show my daughter – that being a “girl” is so much more than just wearing a frilly dress; that we can have well-made things without contributing to the suffering of others.

My mother-in-law, on the other hand, loves buying these sorts of clothes for my daughter (her granddaughter). She is a kind and caring woman, and this is one of her love languages. These clothes are often gauche, overly feminine, expensive and poorly made.

September 10th 2026, 1:42 pm

How to choose the perfect wine for aperitivo hour

Life and style | The Guardian

Whether you go for traditional champagne or sherry, or branch out with muscadet and picpoul, an appetite-whetting glass of wine will set you up for the evening ahead

Beginnings are important. As a writer, I’m all too aware of this: from the right introduction, the rest tends to flow. The same logic applies to drinks: a good beginning eases proceedings. For this reason, I am unbendingly particular about how I take my morning coffee and, if I’m drinking, what form an evening’s aperitif should take. Life’s too short for bad beverages, after all.

An aperitif is arguably less a specific drink than an appetite-whetting moment with a glass of something. But what? Typically, when it comes to wine, an aperitif will be light and crisp, with any fruit character at the more green or citrussy end of the spectrum. Brioche-y sparkling wine, be that champagne, crémant or something English, and dry sherry such as fino and manzanilla, with their savoury notes, are traditional choices to ready your palate for food.

September 10th 2026, 10:27 am

How I Shop with Laura Jackson: ‘Once you have a water filter, you can’t go back’

Life and style | The Guardian

Always wondered what everyday stuff celebrities buy, where they shop for food, and the basic they scrimp on? The creative director talks 80s knitwear, joyful knickers and a love of Boots with the Filter

• How I Shop with Millie Mackintosh

Laura Jackson is a creative director and broadcaster who works across design, food and culture. She co-founded the homewares website Glassette in 2021 and later founded the skincare brand Rocco. Her broadcasting career spans television, radio and digital.

Jackson launched a collection with British jewellery brand Astley Clarke in September 2026, featuring gemstones, celestial motifs and tarot symbolism.

September 10th 2026, 6:13 am

‘People waited 24 hours for a potato!’: how viral queues help – and harm – restaurants

Life and style | The Guardian

It has become common for people to wait in long lines for cafes, bakeries and ice-cream shops. But why? And what do the owners think?

At 9.45am on a warm Saturday in September, a queue snakes down the pavement in Notting Hill, west London. Stretching for 20 yards past office blocks, estate agents and cafes, the line is waiting peacefully for an unusual morning snack: frozen yoghurt. The purveyor is the dessert shop Yo-Chi, which opened only a fortnight ago, one of the many hospitality businesses making queueing an increasingly common part of the British dining experience.

“We wait in line for everything now,” says 23-year-old Hannan Mahamud as she stands midway down the queue with three friends. “I queued for an hour the other week for a cookie, although it wasn’t worth it. We heard about Yo-Chi through a creator on TikTok who works in an office building across the road and posts queue updates. We thought it might be a fun day out.”

September 10th 2026, 6:13 am

‘Scots are the kindest people on earth!’ Meet the Americans moving to Scotland

Life and style | The Guardian

Since Donald Trump’s re-election in 2024, there has been a 63% rise in Americans renting properties in Scotland. Politics is one reason – but there are many other surprising motivations …

Four years ago, when Tammi Gaw, a 50-year-old property adviser, moved from Washington DC to Glasgow with her Scottish partner, friends and family laughed at her. “People back home kept asking me: ‘Ha ha, why would you want to move to Scotland, where it rains all the time?’ Now those same people are asking me: ‘Hey, how do I move there?’”

They are not alone. According to data from Rightmove, 28% of inquiries from Americans about buying a home in the UK are about Scotland, a larger number than for London. And a recent survey from lettings platform Goodlord reported a 63% rise in the number of Americans renting properties in Scotland since Donald Trump’s re-election in November 2024.

September 10th 2026, 3:55 am

The death of the dining room: how mealtimes moved to the kitchen – or the sofa

Life and style | The Guardian

The idea of a room that you use only occasionally for sit-down meals has gone out of fashion. Now people have found better ways to use the space

Name: Dining rooms.

Age: Ancient Romans took meals in a room called a triclinium.

September 10th 2026, 3:55 am

Thursday news quiz: A German shock, tapes that rock, Truss is back but Monty’s gone

Life and style | The Guardian

Test yourself on topical news trivia, pop culture and general knowledge every Thursday. How will you fare?

Every now and then the Thursday quiz stares broodingly out of a rain-streaked window, adopts an immaculate cheekbone-highlighting pose and hums a bit of David Sylvian. The sun shines high above, the “birbs” swoop down upon the crosses of old grey churches, and September is here again. Fifteen questions on topical news, general knowledge and obscure trivia await you. Let us know how you get on in the comments. Allons-y!

The Thursday news quiz, No 264

September 10th 2026, 3:55 am

‘I’m sick of her talking about it’: 11 readers share how GLP-1s have affected their relationships

Life and style | The Guardian

As weight loss drugs have risen all around the world, it has reshaped users’ relationships for better and for worse

As GLP-1 use continues to rise in the US and the UK, people’s bodies are being reshaped – as are their relationships.

“Relationships tend to develop a sense of equilibrium and predictability over time,” says Dr Lindsey Berisha, a licensed clinical psychologist who has worked with clients using GLP-1s for over 10 years. “When one partner undergoes a significant change, it can shift that equilibrium, and even positive change can create uncertainty for both partners.”

September 10th 2026, 3:55 am

You be the judge: should my son finish bottles and packets before opening new ones?

Life and style | The Guardian

Jasper stands accused of being wasteful but feels aggrieved that Mindy says he’s being lazy. Is this a race to the bottom? You decide

• Find out how to get a disagreement settled or become a juror

Opening new products when old ones aren’t empty is wasteful – and he does it to avoid cleaning up

September 10th 2026, 3:55 am

Make tracks: 8 of the UK’s best walking and cycling trails on former railway lines

Life and style | The Guardian

Repurposed railway lines make accessible and family-friendly walking and cycling routes. Here are some of the best, from Somerset to the Highlands of Scotland

Start/finish Coombs Road in Bakewell to Blackwell Mill in Chee Dale, but there are lots of access points along the way
Distance 8.5 miles
Cycle, hike or ride a horse along the Monsal Trail to explore a swathe of Derbyshire’s industrial history. This former stretch of the Midland Railway line winds past the imposing structures of two 18th-century cotton mills, through illuminated railway tunnels and over the Headstone Viaduct, which gives glorious views of the River Wye and Monsal Dale below. Interpretation and listening panels along the route explain the area’s history, geology and wildlife, while a short detour on to Monsal Head offers a panoramic view of the viaduct itself. Pause here for lunch or a pint at the Monsal, or stop in at Hassop Station Cafe, which offers bike rental alongside hefty sandwiches, homemade cakes and wood-fired pizza at weekends.
monsaltrail.org.uk

September 10th 2026, 3:55 am

Hurrah, lie-ins may be good for us – if only I can convince my five-year-old daughter | Arwa Mahdawi

Life and style | The Guardian

CEOs may like to get up at the crack of dawn and go for a run, but I prefer optimising my life with lie-ins, trashy films, swearing and coffee

This evening I’m going to tuck my five-year-old into bed and read her a chapter from one of her princess books, followed by a summary of research recently presented at the annual congress of the European Society of Cardiology. Once upon a time, I’ll tell her, there was a scientist called Dr Nawon Lee who authored a study that found having a weekend lie-in may be very good for you and can protect against high blood pressure. Our accomplished protagonist Dr Lee said: “People should not feel lazy or guilty for sleeping a little longer on the weekend.” And the moral of this story, dear child, is that you should try not to wake your mothers up at 6am every day.

Unfortunately, I’m not sure that all the peer-reviewed science in the world will convince my early riser to have a weekend lie-in. Still, as a big fan of sleep and someone who has never once felt guilty for hitting the snooze button, I have to say I feel vindicated by this new study. CEOs can get up at 4am and run 10 miles before eating five foraged mushrooms if they want to, but I’m going to protect my heart health by sleeping in, any opportunity I can get, thank you very much.

September 9th 2026, 9:54 am

‘Dress good to run fast’: How Black athletes became style icons

Life and style | The Guardian

From Naomi Osaka’s NBA-inspired entrance to Dennis Rodman’s punk aesthetic, Black sportspeople have long used fashion to express identity, defiance and joy

When Long Wave lead writer Nesrine Malik asked me if I’d seen Japanese-Haitian tennis star Naomi Osaka’s incredible pre-match look, I began to wax lyrical about the kimono she donned at Wimbledon a couple of months ago. No, not that look – Nesrine was talking about the NBA-inspired hoodie she wore at the US Open, taking to the court head bowed and hands in pockets, with the theatre of a WWE wrestler. By the time I sat down to write, Osaka had worn another viral walk-on outfit.

The star isn’t the first to acquire as many headlines for her clothes as for her performance. Osaka draws on a long tradition of Black athletes giving crowds their money’s worth through playful and provocative fashion statements. I delved into the history of why so many Black communities have a culture of “presenting”, and how defiance through fashion has found a natural home in sport.

September 9th 2026, 9:09 am

How to turn corn cobs into a delicious chowder – recipe | Waste not

Life and style | The Guardian

A simple, stripped-back soup that lets the freshest, sweetest corn and fluffy, floury potatoes do all the work

Today’s super-simple corn chowder is inspired by one I came across on NewEngland.com that relies on an old zero-waste trick; namely, scraping the spent cobs to release the pulp and sweetcorn “milk” still left on the cob. Like asparagus, corn is best eaten as fresh as can be, so look for whole ears with bright green husks. Keep in the fridge and, for the most flavourful soup, aim to cook them the same day.

September 9th 2026, 9:09 am

Sali Hughes on beauty: the hero products that kept me cool in the long hot summer of 2026

Life and style | The Guardian

From face tints and self-tan to summer scents, these lightweight buys saw me through multiple heatwaves

You’ll normally find me looking back on my favourite products of the past 12 months at year’s end. But this summer has been so freakishly hot and sweaty it has required its own toolkit and, by extension, its own list of exceptionally well-performing products that deserve rapturous commendation.

The first is Refy’s Skin Base (£30), a sheer face tint so thin and so lightweight it has been all I could bear to wear since July. It’s suitable for all skin types, but not at all appropriate for those who hate any hint of shine. While the texture is totally ungreasy, breathable and so comfortable as to be imperceptible, it does look unmistakably dewy, so avoid if you’re devoted to matte. Personally, I take the view that, in this heat, one might as well steer into the skid, but I am, admittedly, at an age when a juicier look works in my skin’s favour. Anyway, this is makeup that truly feels like absolutely nothing, and what it lacks in coverage can be made up with concealer where needed. Maximum points from me (I wear shade 140N).

September 9th 2026, 7:52 am

A moment that changed me: I spent a day with some naturists – and it cured my shy bladder

Life and style | The Guardian

For decades, I had been haunted by paruresis, an inability to urinate in public toilets. But that day of nakedness suddenly, surprisingly, led me to shed my inhibitions

For as long as I can remember, I’ve suffered from a condition called paruresis – also known as shy bladder syndrome. This means that, unless I’m alone in public toilets, I cannot pee, however badly I need to go. I developed tactics to deal with this, such as loitering outside the gents if I see someone going in, so that I can walk in as they walk out. But if someone follows me in, I find I’m just standing there, which I worry looks odd.

I’m a writer, so am often out and about meeting people in cafes, hotels and at events. My agricultural background means I also meet a lot of my interviewees on farms – but at least there I could pop behind a hedge if I needed to go, and be assured of privacy.

September 9th 2026, 4:53 am

Gladys the giant pumpkin: is this the biggest fruit in the world?

Life and style | The Guardian

At one stage, on its way to becoming a smashing success, this plucky pumpkin was packing on 40lb a day

Name: Gladys.

Age: Gladys was germinated on 19 April and pollinated on 30 June.

September 9th 2026, 4:53 am

The rise of hairy young women: ‘I know people who dye their armpit hair, so it stands out more’

Life and style | The Guardian

When Phoebe Bridgers appeared at Venice international film festival with unshaven legs this weekend, it shouldn’t have made headlines – but did. What do young women make of the current expectations around depilation?

In 2026, female body hair feels as if it should be the least of anyone’s concerns. But although we may think we’ve come a long way since Julia Roberts’ unshaven underarm caused a furore at the 1999 London premiere of Notting Hill, depilation remains a staple of many women’s grooming routines – and when singer turned actor Phoebe Bridgers made her Venice film festival debut last weekend, her unshaven legs still made headlines.

Even so, her au naturel look may signal that attitudes are changing – particularly among younger generations. Vogue decreed that “rather than undermining the femininity of the look, unapologetic hair sharpened it”, and pictures of the 32-year-old’s hair-covered calves were generally praised by fans. But what do other gen Z and millennial women make of the decision to ditch the razor?

September 9th 2026, 4:53 am

The Filter Q&A: ask sexual culture and wellbeing expert Alix Fox a question

Life and style | The Guardian

Do you have a question about how to have a healthier, happier, hornier love life? Alix Fox answers your questions live today at 1pm BST (9am EDT).

Login or sign up here to post a question

A good sex life is key to a good life. Want to know how to improve yours, whether that’s practical advice on how to broach the subject of trying something new (and what to do if your partner reacts poorly); how to become more confident at talking dirty or giving constructive in-the-sack feedback; or even how to be intimate with your partner when you’re just plain knackered?

No question is too niche or too embarrassing, too mild or too wild – from how to give great massages and tried-and-tested toys to spend your money on; to how to keep sex comfortable and fun after medical challenges and life changes.

September 9th 2026, 4:53 am

I climbed into the car with three friends. I woke in hospital to find I’d lost them all – and my leg

Life and style | The Guardian

Rob Pike was 17 when he and three of his closest friends were in a car that smashed into a tree and split in half. He explains how he coped with the devastation

After the car stopped rolling and came to rest on its side, Rob Pike remembers being “hyperfixated” on the rainwater pouring down his face. When he tried to wipe it away with his arm, he realised it wasn’t water. “I look at my arm and it is covered in blood. The next moment, it hit me: oh my gosh, we crashed.”

He was in the back seat next to his best friend, Daniel McCoy. “I look up to my left to see if Daniel’s OK. He’s probably about a foot away from my face and … he’s not OK. I’m looking at my dead best friend and I wish that wasn’t my last memory of him, seeing how broken he was.” They were 17.

September 9th 2026, 4:53 am