Carola Long

Fashion houses from Louis Vuitton to Dior and Tom Ford offer casual couture and dressing for seduction

The challenge is finding a two-piece that is stylish and modern, flattering to the real female form — and practical when doing energetic lengths

While some brands were absent or between designers, there was still creativity at play

Its comeback is imbued with modern elegance and the spirit of summer escapism

Estée Lauder’s self-styled ‘lipstick salesman’ was instrumental in shaping the modern prestige industry

After creating car-shaped dresses and tomato bags at Loewe, he now faces the challenges of one of the great fashion houses

From biohacking gadgets to epigenetic testing and hyperbaric oxygen therapy: the anti-ageing devices and treatments being promoted by luxury and lifestyle brands

FT writers and contributors reveal their new favourites, from sunscreen to fragrance

The curator of vintage jewellery shares her tips on how to find the perfect antique treasures — whatever your budget

Two new boutique hotels have added a sprinkle of chic to the sleepy, serene, Île d’Yeu

Geriatric starlet Iris Apfel’s posthumous book is full of bon mots

All the Rage: Power, Pain, Pleasure: Stories from the Frontline of Beauty 1860-1960 by Virginia Nicholson (Virago) As the high-fashion corset returns to the catwalk and the red carpet, thanks to John Galliano and Kim Kardashian, this deep dive into western female beauty over a century seems particularly timely. From details of gruesome early 20th-century cosmetic surgery involving paraffin wax injections to analysis of the idealised women presented by mid-century advertising, it’s a reminder th…

It’s midnight in LA, where Kevin Kwan lives, but this is his preferred time for a phone call. “I’m a night bird,” he says. “If I was doing an interview at 8am, my brain would be foggy and not well-caffeinated . . . I swear to God I will be much better at midnight.” Indeed, the Singapore-born author of bestseller Crazy Rich Asians has his wits about him as he discusses his latest novel, Lies and Weddings. It follows eligible British-Chinese aristocratic Rufus Leung Gresham as his former supermod…

Cécred Moisturizing Deep Conditioner, £37, cecred.com Did we need another celebrity beauty brand? Probably not, but when it’s Beyoncé’s new line, exceptions are made. The eight-piece hair care collection featuring shampoos, leave-ins and treatments caters to all hair types and textures. The star of the Cécred show is the moisturising deep conditioner which is described as “best for curly, coily, and zig-zag coiled hair”. A thick, luxurious blend of shea and murumuru butter and oils such as mori…

In 2011, I went on a river swim at a summer festival called Port Eliot. Everyone taking part wore a yellow swimming hat for visibility and we were warned a photographer would be taking pictures at the end. “No way am I being photographed emerging from a river in a rubber hat,” I told my husband and duly dodged the lens. Unfortunately the photographer turned out to be Martin Parr. I missed my chance to be immortalised, but then again with Parr, a flattering portrait was not guaranteed. For more…

A new documentary explores how the former Dior designer came back from scandal

Paris Fashion Week got into full swing on Tuesday with shows from Dior and Saint Laurent, luxury houses owned by French conglomerates LVMH and Kering respectively. Both are known for a quintessentially French vision and heritage, and with the Olympics starting in Paris in July, all eyes are on the image of the capital city presented to the world. Fashion is a significant part of the national identity, and when it comes to using the global stage provided by the Olympics, LVMH is the one going fo…

In Paris last summer for the couture shows, I made time for a brief shopping pilgrimage. While the world’s 0.01 per cent perused hand-embellished eveningwear, my between-show treat was a snatched detour to the more reasonably priced Soeur boutique. The city is brimming with shops offering their own vision of La Parisienne, but for me, Soeur’s mix of clean shapes, workwear fabrics and retro prints has an easy cool that stands out. I recommend it to anyone else who wants a change from APC, likes…

It’s 11am on a Friday and the busiest counter in Space NK’s King’s Cross store in central London is Rare Beauty, the make-up line from singer Selena Gomez. Wanting to understand its popularity, I get chatting to Tara, a glowy 36-year-old who has come down from Oxfordshire for the day to buy beauty products and has “made a beeline for the concealer”. She’s intrigued to see if Rare Beauty is as good as she’s heard on social media, adding that the brand’s concealer is £10 cheaper than her usual D…

Procrastinating over presents? It’s not a problem — yet — but you might want to step on that ordering, if only to avoid the dreaded last minute stealth tax known as Next Day Delivery. After asking an extended circle of friends what they wanted, I’ve concluded that what most people want is “something useful, but make it special”. Extra-long matches from Pentreath and Hall fit the bill, creating a sense of occasion. A little decadent but hey it’s only 11p a match, maths fans. Or perhaps opt for…