Our recommendations for when you find yourself at home indoors for longer than expected.

Sweet D&D’ers,

Firstly, we hope you and your family are safe and sound. With the endless reams of panic-inducing news and the entire country collectively turning into one frazzled nerve, we’ve been trying to think of ways to bring a little light to this situation. Behind the glare of our screens, we met up as a team to ask each other a few questions: do we unplug, switch off all communications to stem the overwhelming flow of information? Or do we carry on, business as usual? Everything seems sticky, every answer clouded with uncertainty.

Like many people, my kitchen table - usually reserved for wine glass rings, stacks of toast and clean laundry - has now become my desk. As I sat there yesterday trying to push out the worries and focus, I looked up and saw my favourite photograph - my dad’s 20-year-old face, mid-laugh, tacked up on the wall. Next to it, the handwritten words of a Post-it note; “Having people smile when they look at things, we need that in this world”. It’s been a motto of ours for years, but I’ve never felt its potency like I do now.

So, because life is unpredictable, we’ve decided to reshuffle our content and bring you a little series dedicated to warm, good things to make us laugh, think, dream and connect. Here at D&D, we spend a lot of time daydreaming about stuff you can do from home...so we’ve had a few of these up our sleeve for a while. In these times, our homes will become the nucleus of our lives; our worlds within the world, and the moment-to-moment decisions we make within them become our daily bread. We hope these messages bring you a little joy. We hope they give you something to look at and smile.

Molly x

FIRST THING'S FIRST

We feel like those in self-isolation (so all of us…) fall into two categories - those who are good at doing nothing, and those that just aren’t. Some folks get by just fine with minimal structure in the day, moving slowly and happily from coffee to couch, desk to daybed. For others, home becomes a platform for movement. For plotting, sorting and reshuffling their little corner of the world.

For those who find sinking into the safety of home slightly easier, here are a few rituals to make doing nothing feel a little more delicious:

Long, hot baths. Preferably in the morning, with enough bubbles to turn your bathroom into a Yayoi Kusama installation. If it’s an afternoon affair, you can balance the laptop on a stool and revel in the knowledge that your colleagues can’t see your naked body through the conference call (just don’t forget to turn off the camera). We’ve been re-reading Ciara’s little handbook on joyful bathing from Issue 6 of The Sunday Paper, which you can peruse here. Preferably with the hot water running.

While you’re in there, you might want to indulge in the heady pleasure of watching TV in the bath. What could be more delightful than feeling the world melt away under the bubbles as your skin turns to prunes and you catch up on the newest season of Glow? Or letting a facemask sink into your pores as you watch taffeta make a comeback on Next in Fashion? Or falling in love with Taylor Swift in Miss Americana through a panel of steam? For all-day bathers, here’s an even longer list of TV candy for you to scroll through as the hot water tops up.

If you’re more into prose than Amazon Prime, we’ve got a few books to keep your eyes wandering across the page for the next few months. Jacqueline Woodson’s punchy Red at the Bone was our very first book club read (buy it from Waterstones and report back - we’d love to know what you think). David Sedaris’ semi-autobiographical Calypso had us laughing to death and meditating on the trials and tribulations of middle age, and as for Lisa Taddeo’s Three Women...we have no words. We’ll leave that to her.

Spotify, Apple Music and your grandma’s old record player are your best friend during this time. It’s time to give your dad’s most beloved albums a spin, rediscover some old favourites (Snow Patrol? Is that you?) and mine some new artists that might just take you to another world altogether. Here’s a playlist we’ve been loving in the D&D studio (and now at home…)

And for those who need to keep their bodies moving, their brains whirring and their imaginations blooming, we’ve got a few ideas for you too:

It’s time for a spring clean. Sure, the outside world might feel like it’s turned to jelly. But inside, it’s time to scrub, sweep and give the forgotten corners of the house a little love. We get a lot of pleasure from pulling everything out of the cupboards to reassess the cereal, spice and sticky bottle situation. Maybe it’s time to transfer all those half-empty (sorry, half-full) bags of oats and pasta into shiny new mason jars, each one polished and labelled like it’s their first day at school.

As for that nondescript drawer of knotted wires and string, the time has come to face it. Make a little day of trying out all those plugs and USBs, and recycle the ones that have seen better days.

The words ‘comfort eating’ have never been more meaningful. Food is about to become a constant source of cheer and creativity, and now is the time to loop that apron over your head, prise the dusty cookbooks off the shelves and get cooking. For fresh recipes that keep things light, we always look to Hetty McKinnon or Anna Jones, and Alison Roman’s tinned bean recipes has us making thrifty, hearty meals all day long.

Delicious food requires a playlist to match. Here’s one to get you in the mood for dance-stirring, fork-singing and food-baby slumping.

Usually, scrolling through photos of other people’s houses, holidays and stove tops on Pinterest fills us with guilt. But now? Essential. Gather some inspiration for post-Coronavirus home makeovers, DIY ideas and watercolour self-portraits. Behold some of our favourite Pinterest porn here.

For restless souls, sitting down all day in front of a laptop is a no-go. Thankfully, some of the world’s best yoga studios have pulled together to bring us a virtual smorgasbord of at-home workouts. So roll out your mat, light a candle and get ready to stretch out the stress with broadcasted classes from Stretch, Popfit and Brixton Yoga. Clothing optional.

...and for music to move with, turn up these playlists.

We knew this before, but we know it even more now. A good podcast can keep your mind nourished and your thoughts in flux. For true podcast pleasure, listen to Elizabeth Day’s How to Fail (with guests like Fearne Cotton, Cush Jumbo and Alain de Botton looking back on the low-points that made them), The Daily (the New York Times’ brilliant news show) and The C Word (Lena Dunham and Alissa Bennet unpicking the truth behind female icons labelled ‘crazy’).

Audiobooks are a constant source of brain-feeding delight, and a soothing narrator’s voice goes a long way on days like these. Try Heartburn, Nora Ephron’s iconic rendering of food and divorce, narrated by none other than Meryl Streep. If you’ve seen the film, you will have just fallen in love with Jane Austen’s Emma, which you can listen to as you imagine yourself drifting around the grounds of Highbury in a pastel-coloured bonnet. And to rediscover your inner child in the comfort of your own home, listen to Ice Cream for Breakfast by Laura Jane Williams on Audible.

ONE OTHER THING

You’re probably waiting for the bit where we tell you which D&D PJs to be wearing while you indulge in all this at-home self love. But we’re not going to do that. Instead, we thought we’d let you consider this burning question: birthday suit or pyjama suit? Read Ambrosia Hicks delve into this debate here. But of course, the only way to truly find out is by doing your own research. You’ve got time, after all.

LASTLY

A quick update on D&D. Everyone in our internal and external teams are safe. Like most of the country, we’ve swapped the office for our homes for the time being. And our Spanish and Portuguese factories are still safely at work, with all the extra health plans in place just in case anything changes. Our warehouse is also still open and delivering your packages as usual. We have just had a new delivery of bestsellers, so hope that feeds those in need of a little pick-me-up as they settle in to working from home. The wellbeing of our community is always our first priority. So if anything at all changes, we’ll keep you in the loop.