Vitamin C for the sartorial soul.

Barely two weeks into flu season and I find myself at the mercy of a sandpaper throat and hacking cough. I haven’t even been blessed with the gift of a sultry, husky drawl- less Bardot and more a modern day Clint Eastwood.
 
Holed up at my parents’, too much of a baby to face the perils of illness alone, I have spent the last few days in an intolerably lazy fashion, playing up to my illness with exaggerated groans and sighs, moving only to reach for the cough syrup (decidedly less delicious than in my childhood memories), turn the pages in a battered copy of ‘Love in a Cold Climate’ (nothing like aristocratic intrigue for a bit of distraction) and take sips of the seemingly bottomless glass of Berocca that my lovely Mother is wont to provide (“All you need, Lillian, is a bit of Vitamin C.”).
 
Ahh, Berocca. That effervescent beacon of health and deliciousness. Just a glimpse of the bright orange liquid, fizzing away, is enough to jolt me into a moment of health and happiness, and I have been downing it like it is going out of fashion. I remember as a child sneaking small handfuls of chewable Vitamin C tablets from the little plastic jar in the medicine cabinet. Upon discovery, my mouth frothing with sugary orange saliva, my Mother was quick to assert that, although good in small doses, too many Vitamin C tablets would “turn your skin orange”.
 
I am what you would call a Vitamin C enthusiast. I go not a morning without a big, glistening glass of fresh orange juice, and I nearly threw-up with excitement the contents of a pint glass one night upon discovering that a good friend was the granddaughter of Vitamin C pioneer Linus Pauling (seminal life moment, anyone?). And so, having my mother ply me with glass upon glass of Berocca to whip me back to health is something of a dream come true. 

Miu Miu, Isabel Marant, Hermès

The Autumn runways have given me a good sartorial dose of Vitamin C to further ease my sickly ways- pops of bright, cheer inducing orange littered the collections, plastering my face with a cheery smile (when it wasn’t demented into the scowl that constant coughing fits demand).

 A good lick of bright orange lipstick- Morange by MAC- makes for some seriously juicy lips. Some almost-garish platforms by John Galliano will brighten your day every time you look down. And do I really need an excuse to put up this gloriously gaudy YSL Arty Ovale ring?

Some small doses of Vitamin C for the sartorial soul.