The One You Haven't Worn Yet

There's a particular kind of purchase that stays in the drawer with the tissue paper still folded around it. You liked it enough to buy it, and then you couldn't work out when it was supposed to happen.

So here's the short answer. A lace bodysuit works best when you treat it the way you'd treat a good top: tuck it into high-waisted trousers or a long skirt, put a blazer or an open shirt over it, and you have an outfit you could wear to dinner or to the supermarket. Worn on its own it reads as lingerie; worn under something it's the smoothest layer you own, because there's no waist hem to come untucked.

How do you wear a lace bodysuit day to day?

The garment does most of the work for you. Because it fastens between the legs and sits in one unbroken line from shoulder to hip, the front stays flat and the straps stay where you put them, which is the opposite of what happens when a lace cami meets a waistband.

What follows are three ways to wear one, in order of how much being seen each of them asks of you. Start wherever you actually are.

How do you wear a lace bodysuit under clothes?

Put it on under a jumper, a buttoned shirt, a dress you've worn a hundred times. Nobody can see embroidered mesh through a knit, and that's rather the point; this is the version that asks nothing of your day except that you fasten a few hooks in the morning. If you've never worn a bodysuit before, this is where it stops being an idea and becomes a thing you own.

The Vow - Ivory — from £38.35 — Shop →

How do you wear a lace bodysuit as a top?

High-waisted trousers, a leather or denim skirt, wide linen in summer. The waistband covers the lace at the hip, so what shows above it is the embroidered panel across the chest and shoulders, and a blazer or an unbuttoned shirt over the top turns the whole thing into something you'd wear to a long lunch. Keep the rest plain; the bodysuit is already doing the detail.

One practical note. The Vow fastens with hook and eye at the back, so do the hooks up first and pull your trousers on afterwards. It's a small thing and it saves a contortion in a restaurant bathroom later.

Can you wear a lace bodysuit on its own at home?

With nothing over it, in your own home, on an evening that belongs to you. This is the route most women reach for last, and it's worth saying plainly that it doesn't need a reason, an audience or a date in the diary. Our piece on what cut-outs are actually for goes further into that idea if it interests you.

Does a lace bodysuit have to be black?

Black is the default because it's the easiest thing to buy without thinking, and there's nothing wrong with owning one. But colour changes what the piece is for. Emerald under a camel coat, amber with denim, ivory with grey marl: the lace stops reading as evening-wear and starts belonging to the rest of your wardrobe.

Which colour suits you is mostly a question about contrast. If you want the embroidery itself to be the thing people notice, choose a colour that sits away from your own skin tone; if you'd rather the texture read quietly, a tone closer to your skin will do that. And if you simply like emerald, that's a good enough reason. Which one do you keep going back to look at?

The Vow - Emerald — £38.35 — Shop →

What can you wear instead of lace if you don't like it?

Some women don't want embroidery anywhere near them, and that's a preference rather than a gap in confidence. If what appeals to you about a bodysuit is the line of it, the fact that it holds a shape, then a bandage piece gives you that with no mesh at all.

The Entrance is cut in strappy bandage panels that carve out the waist, with adjustable straps and an underwire built in. It's the structured end of the same idea: one piece, one line, nothing to tuck.

The Entrance — £34.75 — Shop →

How do you wear a lace bodysuit when you're staying in?

Plenty of women reading this have no dinner booked, no plans this weekend and no appetite at all for getting dressed up with nobody coming over. If that's where you are, route one is the whole answer: wear it under what you were going to wear anyway, and let that be it.

The quiet version counts. A woman who wears embroidered mesh under a fleece on a Wednesday has done the same thing as a woman who wears it to a party, which is to say she's dressed for herself. There's more on where that sits in the Sensuality chapter.

How do you make a lace bodysuit last?

Hand-wash it and lay it flat to dry; that instruction comes with every piece in the range and it's the single thing that keeps embroidered mesh looking new. Fasten the back hooks before it goes into the water, because loose hooks are what catch the mesh and pull a thread.

Keep it folded in a drawer and off the hanger. The straps on a bodysuit carry the weight of the whole garment, and on a hanger they stay under that weight for months at a time. Folded, it holds its shape between wears.

Wear it

The Vow - Ivory — from £38.35 — Shop →

The Vow - Emerald — £38.35 — Shop →

The Entrance — £34.75 — Shop →

The full range sits in lace bodysuits at Love Your Beauty.

Common questions

Can you wear a lace bodysuit as a top during the day?

Under a blazer or a buttoned shirt, yes, in most settings. With nothing over it the embroidered mesh panels are sheer, so on its own it's an evening or at-home piece.

Do you need a bra under a lace bodysuit?

Not with these. The Vow has a lightly wired, structured cup built into it and The Entrance is underwired, so the support is part of the garment, and a bra underneath would only show through the mesh.

How do you go to the loo in a bodysuit?

You undo the fastening at the gusset, which is what it's there for, and do it back up afterwards. It takes a few seconds once you've done it twice, and it's the reason most people stop worrying about bodysuits after the first wear.

What size should you buy?

Go by your usual bra band and your hip measurement; dress size tells you less here, because a bodysuit has to fit at both ends. The Vow closes with hook and eye at the back and The Entrance has adjustable straps, so there's some room to set the fit yourself.

Can you wear a lace bodysuit if you'd rather not show your arms or your back?

Yes, and this is what an open shirt over the top is for. Worn that way the lace shows at the front only, and your shoulders and back stay covered all evening.