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Comment: enough with the haute hygge, it’s time to leave the house

 (Instagram / Madonna)
(Instagram / Madonna)

The week that started with Blue Monday and may yet see snow is a bold time to make the case for leaving the house but never let it be said that Homes & Property is a haven for shrinking violets.

I’m fully signed up to January as a time for home comforts — long nights and frosty days are a good reason to cosy up with books, soup and cashmere.

But news from the fashion pages of a new vogue for lavish designer bathrobes has me quaking in my slippers at the thought of yet more time indoors.

Madonna flaunted green Bottega Veneta on Instagram, Tom Ford has a leopard print one selling for upwards of £2,500, and Lil Nas X apparently has a customised number.

Haute hygge’s definitely a trend but I’m praying it’s one with a short shelf life.

As someone who writes about homes for a living you might expect me to be on board with staying in, but one of the chief pleasures of my job is in nosing around other people’s homes and I enjoy it plenty as a social activity, too.

While the Prime Minister may or may not have been hosting parties at his home on a semi-regular basis throughout the pandemic, most of us were not and, frankly, this enforced hibernation has made us all a bit weird — I don’t know what Boris’s excuse is.

With the lifting of most Plan B restrictions this week, I’m hoping this year we banish the phrase, “As we spend more time at home”, for good.

It’s too soon to pack up the home office just yet, but maybe the day when my living room loses its depressing “mission control” corner is not so far off.