Robes are a different story. Our most recent robes have been made of silk dupioni, a wonderful textured silk fabric which has a glorious sheen and is available in all those wonderful colors which seem to be available only in silk, but in surveys we’ve done our csutomers have asked for one thing repeatedly, and that is more easy care fabrics. So of course, we listened.

We have finally obtained fabric with a beautiful sheen that looks like silk dupioni, but  isn’t. It’s an artificial fibre, fully washable, but still available in some gorgeous colors. It resists creasing, doesn’t shrink and while crisp, still feels like the real thing.  In fact the only downside is that it comes in a narrow range of colors, but not to worry, there are still 68 colors, and we’re pretty sure your favorite will be amongst them.

We’ll be updated some prices on the site straight away. Meantime if you’d like us to make your a design using the new fabric, just let me know!

Nightgown in hand painted silk with short gold satin robe.

The best way to choose a see-through nightgown online is to pay little attention to the picture.  The name of the textile used is generally more useful. Chiffon is one of the most commonly used sheer fabrics, as are georgette, tulle, double georgette and organza. Lace can be quite revealing depending on the pattern, and the sheer sex appeal of bare skin behind rare black lace can not be over-stated. Avoid charmeuse and satin when looking for something transparent, but don’t reject silk and cotton, both have transparent versions.

Cotton voile and cotton lawn can both be revealing and are by no means opaque. When unprinted, voile is especially revealing. The delicacy of cotton lawn makes it ideal for undergarments. For day wear lawn garments will need underclothes or a lining, but for a nightgown it may be the ideal fabric, especially when lace trimmed.

Often used to create wedding veils, tulle is a soft transparent fabric. Tulle was most fashionable during the 20s and 30s when it was often used to make delicate peignoir and wraps. Silk tulle is very luxurious and available in a great many colors. Tulle is extremely transparent and can often be left unfinished as the edges do not fray.

Chiffon is the fabric most often used to make see through nightgowns and lingerie. Acetate chiffon can be quite harsh, polyester chiffon is practical and washable, and silk chiffon is very luxurious. A certainly wont want to answer your front door in a chiffon nightgown as a single layer of chiffon is very revealing. Chiffon garments are usually more expensive because they take longer to make. Each seam has to be doubled to prevent the fabric from fraying and reducing the lifetime of the garment.

There is one type of chiffon which is a little more subtle, pleasantly transparent rather than glaringly see-through, and this is printed or painted chiffon. The best effect comes from hand-painted silk chiffon; wonderfully sensuous and delightfully subtle, it oozes sex-appeal especially in animal print designs which are so very different from the more common printed satins. Printed chiffon is also ideal for nightgowns. Depending on the design it can vary from transparent to almost completely opaque, but still soft and feminine.

Georgette is slightly more opaque than chiffon, but also a soft drapey fabric, double georgette is almost opaque, which in some ways makes it the ideal fabric for lingerie. It gives only a hint of the body beneath. Double silk georgette has the most glorious feel. If your aim is to be subtly seductive then this is the fabric for you.

Organza is rarely used in nightgowns as it a stiff fabric, though still transparent. Quite the opposite of chiffon, organza fabric is still and will stand out from the body, but this can be stunning when designed well.

Most women like to take a subtle approach to sex. For this reason printed silks, cotton lawn and georgette are the best fabrics to choose.

Nightgown in hand painted silk with short gold satin robe.

In a word, yes.  A nightgown can be anything, from a simple cotton shift to a few patches of lace, a wisp of lace and a ribbon.  It can be modest or revealing, sophisticated or sluttish, silk or cotton, long or short. The word nightgown covers a huge spectrum of very different garments, but there’s no doubting the truth, the right nightgown can improve not only your sex life but also your sleep and your self-esteem. Nightgowns are important, not just because of the way they look, but because of the way they make you feel.

For many women, bedtime is the only time of day where they get time for themselves. Time to brush hair, remove makeup, add face cream and the all important tiny dab of perfume which helps you sleep just that little bit better.  So bedtime is a time when you don’t haev to settle for anyone else’s view of that you should wear, you can be the essential you and somewhere in the worlds huge collection of nightgowns, is one which will help you.

Nothing has such a romantic feel to it as a long sweeping nightgown, especially when it feel good against your skin and has an all important lace trim. Once of the joys of my job is reading  the emails we receive where our wonderful clients share why they decided to buy a special nightgown and how it helped them.

We recently received on from a new Mom who found she had no energy, her life was so wrapped up in her baby, and she felt so tired and unable to cope she was shutting the rest of the world out. Fortunately her own Mom bought her one of our maternity nightgowns, a practical design but in luxury fabric. It brightened her life and helped her start to take care of herself again, not just just her baby.

Another client bought her nightgown after getting divorced, and having been there myself, I understood how she felt. She knew she was better off without her ex, but the sense of betrayal, of waste, of genuine grief had left her unsteady, not sure what direction her life should take. She bought a wonderful silk nightgown in a color she loved and told us ‘I knew that if I was ever going to find love again this time it would be on my terms; somehow a nightgown says that in a way day clothes don’t. ‘  Some months later she bought a fabulous short, sexy babydoll. I didn’t ask, but something tells me her life was back on track!

So I can say with certainty from the emails I receive that nightgowns improve your sex life, and they do it in more ways than I think I can mention.

• Choose the right color and style for you, not what’s in fashion, and you know you’ll look especially fabulous.We make more styles in more colors than anyone else.
• Made to measure makes the most of your figure, emphasizing the good and glossing over the bad.It doesn’t matter what size you are, the nightgown will be made to fit.
• Mo more worries about straps that fall down or boobs that fall out. Our designs are created for real women, who actually move AND have boobs.
• No sweaty nylon or cheap chiffon, only fabric which feels wonderful against your skin. Our favorite fabrics are silks, satins and cotton lawn.
• No cheap construction, frayed hems or bows that fall off. Every item hand made just for you, and made in the USA.
• Long sweeping designs with extravagant lace trim for when you enjoy feeling every inch the romantic heroine.
• Short sexy styles for when you’d rather be the hunter than the hunted.
• Historically based styles to pander to all your fantasies.

Nightgowns can improve your sex life by making you feel glamorous and sexy and filling you with confidence in a way only a made to measure garment can.  So when you think of the word nightgown, don’t think of something your grandmother wore, think instead of nightgowns which have a certain style.

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I had pizza for lunch today, and it was delicious. So much so that I decided to write down, carefully, what I had chosen. I went to tear a piece of paper off my pad when I noticed that the box was telling me clearly that this pizza had been made especially for me. And I realized that  peignoirs and nightgowns can be just like a pizza if they are custom made.

What’s interesting about the observation is that until around hundred years ago, if you bought new clothes, they were always custom made. Custom made was normal. Most women not only had a dressmaker they were capable of making their own clothes. If you were rich then it was always the dressmaker, and the result was two fold.

1. Clothes used to fit.

2. There were no standard sizes.

Of course there have always been standard patterns, but all dressmakers were taught as part of their art, how to measure clients and adjust the patterns accordingly.  So although your great grandma wore corsets all day, she never worried that she was no longer a size six, because the concept didn’t exist. So how and why did things change?

In the 19th century fashion as we know it did not exist. Of course styles changed over time, but truthfully the concept of something being ‘in’ in January and ‘out’ in June was not something your ancestors or mine would have found credible, because it seems incredibly wasteful.  One man,as they say in the film trailers, changed that almost single handedly. His name was Charles Worth.

In 1858 Worth (an Englishman) opened a shop in Paris, and because he was a talented designer, he attracted the highest class of client, the Empress of France, the actress Sarah Bernhardt, the singer Dame Nellie Melba.  Worth had a distinctive style, he avoided fussiness and frills and created more ‘sophisticated’ clothes, once reason for this was simple. Simpler outlines were easier and cheaper to make.  Clients loved Worth and his ideas were considered, for the first time, better than their own. Instead of dictating what they wanted, the customers waited for him to show model clothes, they then chose a garment and had it made in their size and favorite color and fabric.

Worth was, without a doubt and artist, but his legacy was a complete change in the world of clothing manufacture. As the cult of the designer grew the customers became less and less important until the major requirement became the design. Women didn’t want to look beautiful, they wanted to wear Worth or Chanel or Dior and they wanted in such quantities that a new idea was born, that of creating clothes which didn’t fit any one particular person, but were made to general sizes.

Even so, until the sixties, most dress shops had a department whose job was to take the ‘standard’ dress and alter it to fit the client, but with time even this had died out in all but the best stores. These days it is important that the label reads the right size and the logo says the right thing. Flattering the customer seems to be incidental, and since items are made in standard colors or sizes, the opportunity to for true style and flare is very rare.

So, when is a peignoir like a pizza? When it’s made the old fashioned way, to fit in size and shape, to flatter in color and design. When it is made with the client and the purpose in mind. A peignoir is like a pizza when it is made to order.

Moonlit Merlot, romantic peignoir set from Certain Style

It’s much easier for men to buy lingerie for the women in their lives if they buy online, especially if you buy from us but there are some simple things to look for when choosing an online store which will make your task easier.Before you go online shopping try to find out what size you are looking for. Take a look at one of the size tags in her clothes, but please be sure to check something that fits (like an item she wore yesterday) and don’t stick with just one. Sizes vary far more than you can imagine, so it’s best to get a picture of more than one. Standard sizes allow for a woman’s hips to be two inches larger than her bust. Try to check her hip size as well, as many women are pear shaped and may need top and bottom in different sizes to get the best fit. If you really cant find out, choose a store with a helpful attitude, some have programs where they will contact the woman on your behalf and get her measurements without spoiling the surprise.

Before you buy think, about whether your gift will ever be worn. The chances are that if it is too revealing or makes her feel silly, it will end up stuck in a drawer. If that’s the direction you want to go in, you may have to get there in small steps.

Before you decide to buy, check that the store you have chosen has a well displayed telephone number and give them a call. You can tell a lot by whether the phone is answered. You want your queries dealt with promptly so if you call at a reasonable time (check where the store is) and there is only an answering machine, you may want to give them a miss. Best of all, use live chat if it is available.

Once you have basic size information look at the numbers. If all you’ve gathered is S M L or XL then you need to do a little more research. Most lingerie sites will have a size chart, check the values you have against this chart. If her bust is smaller than 30 or larger than 40, the chances are that most sites won’t sell her size, in which case you buy made to measure or look for a plus size store. If you are buying for a special occasion, made to measure is the way to go, though it is generally more expensive.

The biggest mistake men make when buying lingerie on the web is that they get enthusiastic about the pictures. You are looking at a model. She is probably very tall and usually a very small size. You may be buying for someone the same, but the chances are that the woman in your life in shorter and wider. There are quality lingerie sites on the web, but take a look at the prices. You get what you pay for. Cheaply made garments may not fit particularly well, this is fine with a loose style, but if you are looking at figure hugging perfection, consider that someone has probably pinned the garment at the back, where you can’t see it, to make it look that way.

Think about the shape of the woman you are buying for. If she is pear shaped, (more than 2 inches bigger at the hips than the bust – and most women are) then unless you buy made to measure you will not be able to fit her with something really figure hugging, so opt for something that will suit her shape, like a babydoll nightgown which is tight around the bust but wide around the hips. If you are buying this as a romantic gift, why not give her a romantic gown? Something long and silk, with a lace trim would be ideal. Transparent may be sexy, but it isn’t romantic. For the ultimate in romance, take a look at peignoir sets.  This is the item most women want, but won’t buy for themselves.

Women with large cup sizes may find that they burst out of standard size nightgowns. If this is the case then a nightgown where the skirt hangs from a yoke will look better. This doesn’t have to be the sort of style your Mom would wear, there are plenty of short sexy styles which don’t have fitted busts. If your wife has small breasts then something with ruffles or pleating over the breast area will often be the most flattering.

Have you heard her say she hates her legs? If so, pick something long. I promise that if you get her something she really likes, and most importantly feels good in, you’ll get the effect you are looking for more than if you went for something which really only appeals to you.

Finally, this is a gift, so get it wrapped. Some companies (Certain Style is one of them) supply in a lovely box as a matter of course, others stuff the item in a bag. The web site should say, but if not, call, don’t leave it to chance and if you don’t buy made to measure be sure you can return it if it doesn’t fit.

Silk nightgown available in almost any two colors you can imagine.

It’s no coincidence that when a woman dumps a man or becomes a dumpee, she often heads straight for the hairdresser. A new look is in order. Self esteem is at stake and confidence is the key to recovery. But there are times in life when confidence slips, just a little, and you’re not aware of it. Over time is gets worse, but slowly and insidiously so that when the problem finally becomes noticeable, there is no sign of the event that started it all. This hits a lot of women when they have their first child. Something changes, and even though you don’t have anything which could be described as post partum depression, you know you’re different, somehow softer, and that may not be something you feel comfortable with. I know in my own case that after my son was born I cried far more easily than I had before, and that’s something which has never really changed.The process of restoring lost confidence is a difficult one for anyone at any age, the best advice is to boost it regularly and make sure it never disappears completely. The days right after childbirth are an important time for many reasons, with so many changes in your life, feeling vulnerable and with a new baby to look after it’s easy to forget that husbands also go through a change, some begin to feel left out, others, though delighted with the child, feel slightly sad, they know the core relationship has changed and in some marriages cracks appear where in reality there is no need for them. This problem is not a trivial one in any way, and it is not my intention to trivialise it here, but I know of cases where the problem was solved, not by drugs or counseling or divorce, but by a nightgown.

I first heard from Julia when she bought a nightgown from me as a present from her daughter. It was a lovely long nightgown of lace and satin with a pretty matching robe in a beautiful shade of blue. She wanted the nightgown made so her daughter could feed her brand new baby, and we were happy to comply. I later got an email showing Marie, Julia’s daughter in the nightgown with her baby and I thought no more about it, till a few months later I actually met Julia at a business woman’s conference in Orlando and she told me the story behind her gift.

As Marie’s planned and welcomed pregnancy drew to a close Julia felt sure she saw some signs of strain. The baby was Marie’s world and when Julia took her on a shopping spree she was only interested in baby clothes. Julia suggested buying a nightgown, but Marie could see no point, so Julia decided to take action and ordered the nightgown in Marie’s favorite color. Naturally it fitted perfectly so when Marie looked in the mirror there was no baggy T shirt over a soggy stomach. Her self confidence soared. Dressed in satin and outlined in lace Marie felt good and it began to show. In only a short time, nature took it’s course, Marie and her husband discovered each other again and Julia felt that potential disaster had been averted. And all because of a nightgown.

Of course it doesn’t have to be a nightgown. The important thing here was that Marie’s confidence received a boost when it was needed. Would a trip to a hairstylist have been just as effective? I have no idea. But I do know that nightgowns are more important than you think, and nightgown therapy, though it sounds silly, is very real.

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Barefoot Bride photo by Polina Osherov

The big thing about the web is supposed to be the opportunity for dialogue with customers. Rather than simply developing products and telling customers why they should want them, you get an opportunity to find out what the customers actually want.

I’ve come to the conclusion that many companies are paying lip service to this. They appear to be asking, but the truth is it’s business as usual, and it’s something I’ve been trying to avoid with Certain Style.

It’s my personal belief that many of the nightgowns for sale are  all about men, and not about the women who wear them. I like to feel good in a nightgown and that doesn’t usually mean exposing bits I’d rather were covered. I know a lo of your agree, but over the last few months as we strove to introduce a Bridal range, Ive also heard from women who want who have pointed out to me that sometimes their purpose in donning a nightgown is to be/feel/appear sexy, so we listened. Today we’ve just finished adding our new ‘sunshine’ collection to the website, and part of that is a our new bridal nightgown set, Barefoot Bride.  Consisting of a chiffon nightgown with tiny lace underlay, the chiffon is layered but still very revealing, fluttering, feminine but very sexy and designed for the bride who knows what she wants, and how to get it.

Of course we didn’t stop there. I like animal prints, but when it comes to lingerie they can look cheap and nasty. A great deal depends on the fabric design. As a result I was overjoyed to find a gorgeous giraffe print for our new babydoll nightgown the fabric is ultra light pure silk chiffon and probably the most gorgeous fabric in our growing collection, but we don’t have a lot, so head on over to our website a grab one while you can!

Please let us know what you think of the new collection by adding a comment below.

After I don’t know how many years of following the at times confusing antics of Jack, Hurley, Kate et al the whole thing came to an end. Loose end were tied up, most, but not all items were resolved and if the end wasn’t completely closed, then that is just the way it should be, only IT WASN’T.

As everyone gathered, smiling, holding hands, revealing that they were, in fact all dead, and apparently happy about it, LOST came to what I can only describe at the least satisfying ending I have ever seen, and yes, I do mean it was worse the ending of Battlestar Galactica.

When Bobbie woke up from his ‘dream’ (you have to be old to get this one) we knew it was becaue the writers of Dallas had realised that they had written out the most popular character and ratings were suffering. We laughed and let them get away with it, because they were admitting they were wrong.

If the writers of LOST had admitted that they had been leading us all up an intriguing garden path which ultimately lead to nowhere, that they had no idea how to meld electromagnetism, ancient myth, time travel and alternate universes together into a compelling ending, we could have pitied them and enjoyed their best attempt, but this was simply a betrayal, and for that there is no forgiveness.

If, by any chance, they thought that they were breaking ground by dealing with death, a ‘taboo’, and that the finale would, as a result garner praise, then in this house at least they score a bit fat zero. Hanging around in a church smiling and holding hands isn’t dealing with death. Grief, anger, challenges to faith are real ways we deal with death, and all these were markedly absent.

I think what I resent most is the implication since Sunday that ‘thinking’ people loved the ending, while only those tedious little people, the linear un-thinkers, felt it was unsatisfying. Now that is an old tactic, and rather unworthy. So let me say upfront that by that definition I am happy to admit to being a tedious little person. The end of LOST was dreadful and an insult to all those who had taken the characters to heart. Contrast it with the finale of 24- when Jack Bauer himself thanked fans for their support at the beginning. There was no mystery to 24, just good writing, some great characters and solid writing.  And no insult to the fans.

Why can’t the writers admit it, they got more than a little lost.

I’ve already spent far more time on this than it merits. Time to get back to nightgowns and our new, exciting sunshine collection. Meantime I’ll be watching for the writers and producers of LOST, but only to avoid all their future projects.

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It’s an easy choice, or so most people think. Cotton is cheap, practical and every day. Silk is for special occasions, it’s delicate, sensuous and definitely dangerous. Almost opposites.  So you’d probably be surprised if I told you that cotton is often the more expensive of the two, and when it comes to strength, silk usually wins hands down.

Of course there are many kinds of cotton, some combined with polyester and some just left relatively course. I’m betting you’ve had the experience of owning something crisp and cotton only to find the crispness gone when the fabric was washed. That’s because left to it’s own devices cotton is, or at least can be, very very soft. When it’s crisp it’s often because it has been sprayed with chemicals in manufacture. Washing removes the chemicals.

Cotton is derived from the fiber boll of the cotton plant and it the most common natural fiber in use in the fashion industry. It has been spun into thread, woven into cloth and dyed since before records began, but the Greeks only learned about it around the time of Alexander the Great and cotton didn’t become common in the UK until the 15th Century. In contrast the plant was cultivated in the Americas and has been found in Peruvian tombs.

Silk on the other hand is not grown, but farmed, as it comes from the cocoon of the silk moth. Legend has it that the fabric was discovered by the Empress of China when the cocoon of a moth feel into her tea as she sat below a mulberry tree. When she went to remove the cocoon she found that it unraveled and asked her servants to pull the thread out. They were amazed at the length of it and experimented with the creation of fiber and cloth. The fiber the cocoon is made from has a very odd triangular cross section, and this results in the wonderful sheen which has made silk fabric so famous and sought after that for centuries it’s production was regarded as a state secret.

But this does not answer the question. Which is better? As usual the answer depends. Silk and cotton absorb dyes differently. Silk accepts color well and can give great vivid colors which gleam in the light. Cotton on the other hand is matte and and although it dyes fairly well, never seems to become as vibrant. Printed cotton can be stunning, but hand painted silk may once again have the edge, since it manages to achieve a degree of subtlety and shading cotton lacks.

Both are ‘natural’ fibers which allow the body to breath, an important point when choosing nightwear or lingerie and both can feel wonderful next to the skin, depending on the type of fabric chosen. Cotton mixed with polyester for example can be very crisp, while cotton voile or cotton lawn are luxuriously soft. The same can be said for silk, where silk dupioni has a crisp texture while silk  charmeuse is wonderfully soft and light.

But in the 21st century women are all about practicality and for that reason silk will always be reserved for special occasions because as we all know, only cotton is a practical fabric.

But is that really true? There is a popular conception that silk is not washable. It is true that silk can shrink when washed, but actually so can cotton, and the shrinkage is usually very small. In fact most silks wash well even in a washing machine as long as they are treated fairly gently, the water temperature is low and no harsh chemicals are applied. Even silk dupioni can be washed, though it may loose some of it’s luster. Silk is actually a stronger fiber than cotton, and since it absorbs dye you can wash silk without seeing the same level of color fade as from printed cotton.

So choose you priority and choose your fabric. If you love silk but have always chosen cotton because it’s more practical, you might like to think again.  Take a look at our latest, soft lawn cotton nightgown and see what you think.