pyjamas

I was scrolling on my phone one evening, the kind of absent, end-of-day scroll that doesn’t seem to lead anywhere, when I landed on a clip from Mollie-Mae’s documentary. She was walking through her wardrobe, gesturing towards rails of clothes and shelves of handbags, all of which passed me by. What stopped me was a drawer. Opened casually, almost as an aside. Inside it: neatly folded pyjama sets.

I found myself leaning closer to the screen. Designer Shoes and handbags have never really held my attention, but soft cotton pyjamas, properly matched, will do it every time. I zoomed in, curious about the fabric, the brand. It felt telling that this was the thing that stayed with me — not the glamour, but the clothes meant for the hours no one else sees.

I did a bit of Googling afterwards and re-encountered a fact I’ve come across before: over an average lifespan — say, seventy-eight years — we’ll spend somewhere between twenty-five and twenty-eight of them asleep. Roughly a third of a life, given over to rest. I opened a few tabs. Pyjama brands. Cotton sets. Nothing urgent. I’m famously slow to decide on these things. I always ask myself the same question — do I need this? — and the answer is almost always no. It’s how I stop my impulsive shopping habit in its tracks. So I left the tabs open, hovering on my laptop like a thought I wasn’t finished with just yet.

A few weeks later, during an otherwise unremarkable food shop, I found myself stalled in the clothing aisle at the big Sainsbury’s. My hands drifted over stacks of soft cotton without much intention. A purple-and-cream striped set caught my eye. Then another. I took in the rest of the rail: pyjamas printed with small dancing bananas; others in tidy checks. I picked one up. Put it back. Let me imagine, briefly, what it might be like to own something deliberately nice to sleep in — chosen, not inherited from the bottom of a drawer. I even took a photo of it. Then, as I so often do, I stepped away. Practicality won out. The trolley rolled on, the photo burning a hole in my back pocket as I perused the rest of the aisles.

It was only later, at my hen do, when I unwrapped an adorable sage green set with frilled sleeves, that the thought returned and settled. I think I actually want to commit to this, I thought. This is something I want to make more room for. To romanticise sleep. To treat rest as something worth dressing for, even if I still wake up with birds’ nest hair and bad breath.

Several months on, the tally has quietly grown. I own four sets now. A navy silk pair scattered with zodiac signs; a pale green one patterned with sausage dogs in little vests; another, a gift, dotted with small flowers. And one that is simply stripes and a collar, which fills with the sudden urge to host a slumber party whenever I wear it.

What I’ve noticed is not the accumulation so much as the choosing. Reaching for something with care at the end of the day. Opting for what will feel soothing against the skin, what will bring a small, uncomplicated pleasure after everything else has been dealt with. Clothes that make a clear distinction between daytime and rest. Something that signals, very clearly, that the day has ended.

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There is a particular pleasure in changing into them when evening comes. The shedding of whatever I’ve worn all day, clothes that have absorbed emails and errands and the faint anxiety of being perceived, and the deliberate choice of something nicer. I like that pyjamas ask nothing of me. They do not need to look good under a coat, survive the weather or pass for acceptable in the corner shop. Their job is comfort, and they do it well. But most importantly, I feel damn cute in them too.

For years, I resisted this. I thought that it was a waste of money when I could instead recycle through old University t-shirts or giant XXL shirts that I deliberately picked up in the men’s section. I’m asleep, I would think, why bother? But somewhere along the way, that thinking has shifted. I’ve found myself wanting to thread comfort into even the smallest, most unobserved parts of my life — the moments that belong to no one else. Perhaps it’s the same instinct that draws me to certain mugs, the ones I reach for again and again. If I’m going to drink this much coffee and tea, why wouldn’t I want to do it from something decorated with small, cheerful suns? It turns out that pleasure, like novelty, doesn’t need to be grand to matter.

But I think there is also something grounding about owning clothes that exist purely for private hours. Pyjamas are not aspirational. They are not for photographs or first impressions. They are worn in kitchens late at night for that evening snack, in the moments before sleep, on slow weekend mornings when the light creeps in around the curtains, and you’re holding that steaming cup of coffee to your face to wake you up. They hold the shape of us when we are most ourselves.

At the end of the day, I like having something to change into that doesn’t belong to who I was at nineteen, or who I’m meant to be tomorrow. Just something comfortable. Something chosen.