A Letter From Beatrice · Founder of Beatrice & Rose

London · July 2026 · 6 min read

You Wrote to Me About One Linen Top. So I Spent This Year Making Fifteen More.

On the six things I insisted on for every piece in our new Linen Edit, how it compares to the summer tops you have been buying, and why the whole collection is reduced right now.

I am Beatrice. This spring, my daughter Rose made me a grandmother.

She was born in the same little London studio where I made my very first dress, twenty years ago, on my late mother’s sewing machine. Three generations of us now, under one roof. I have spent most of this summer with her asleep on my shoulder, reading letters with one hand.

Because last summer I wrote to you about a single linen top called the Zamma. And I did not expect what came back.

Women wrote to me. Not about the price, or the delivery. They asked me the same question, over and over, in slightly different words. Do you have it in another shape? Something with a collar. Something sleeveless for the really hot days. Something longer, to wear over trousers.

One woman in Harrogate put it better than I ever could. She said she had finally found one top she could wear all summer, and now she wanted a whole wardrobe that felt like that. She was right, and it rather stopped me in my tracks.

I read her letter sitting on the studio floor, the way I used to sit when Rose was small. And I thought: there are only so many summers. I would like the ones I have left to be spent in something I actually feel like myself in. I would like that for you too.

So I spent this year making it. The Linen Edit is sixteen pieces. Shirts, tops, tunics and sleeveless vests, all made from the same real linen as the Zamma, all cut for a real woman rather than a girl of twenty. I argued for six things across every single piece, usually with a supplier who wanted me to do the cheaper thing instead.

1. Real 100% linen in every single piece.

Not a blend, and not the polyester they sell you as “linen look”. The real thing, woven to breathe, so it stays cool when the heat sits heavy and softens like a good cotton sheet the more you wash it. I would not put a piece in this collection that did not pass that test.

★★★★★“It is the only fabric I can wear in the worst of the summer without feeling sticky by lunchtime.”Carol R., Harrogate

2. Every shape, so there is one for your day.

This was the whole point. A collared shirt for when you want to look put together, a sleeveless vest for the hottest afternoons, a longer tunic to wear over trousers, a soft short sleeve for everything in between. You should not have to change what you like in order to stay cool.

★★★★★“I bought the sleeveless one and the long sleeve shirt. Between the two I have been covered from June onwards.”Pauline L., York

3. Sleeves that cover the tops of your arms.

Without adding a single degree of warmth, and made to roll softly to the elbow on the days you want them shorter. It is the thing women my age thank me for most, so I made sure it ran through the whole collection and not just one piece.

★★★★★“Finally, sleeves that cover the tops of my arms and still keep me cool. I have three of them now.”Diane M., Bath

4. Cuts that skim, and never cling.

Loose where you want it loose, so the air moves underneath, instead of grabbing the one part of you that you would rather it left alone. Every piece was fitted on a real woman before I signed it off.

★★★★★“It skims straight over the middle I am self-conscious about, instead of hugging it. The first summer clothes in years that do.”Linda K., Norwich

5. Sizes from a UK 8 to a 24, in everything.

Not the small ones only, with the larger sizes quietly missing from the prettiest pieces. If it is in the Linen Edit, it comes in the full range. I have been on the wrong side of that in a changing room myself and I was not going to do it to you.

★★★★★“I am a 22 and I could actually choose which one I wanted, instead of taking whatever was left.”Janet S., Chester

6. Colours chosen to sit with each other.

Soft neutrals and gentle colours, each one picked to work with the trousers and jeans already in your wardrobe, and with the other pieces in the collection. That is how one top quietly becomes a summer wardrobe.

★★★★★“I started with the beige and went back for the navy and the sage. They go with everything I own, and with each other.”Maureen T., Exeter

The Linen Edit, against the summer tops you have been buying

You can find a summer top for sixty pounds almost anywhere. I know, because before I made these I bought a great many of them, trying to find the ones that did not let me down by lunchtime. Here is the difference, laid out plainly.

I refuse to make summer clothes that ask a woman to choose between staying cool and looking like herself. That is the whole reason this collection exists.

Why the whole collection is reduced now

We are marking our anniversary, so the entire Linen Edit is reduced. Every piece is £39.95, from £99.99, and when you take more than one the discount stacks further, up to 30 percent on top.

I will be plain about it. At this price we are barely breaking even on linen this good. I am telling you because it is true, and because once the anniversary sale ends, this price goes with it. There is no plan to bring it back.

If twenty years of running this little boutique has taught me anything, it is that a woman who finds one piece that works usually comes back for a second. That is the quiet bet I am placing in writing you this letter.

Folded and ready to go out. Wrapped by hand, the way every order has left us.

It is the collection I am proudest of in twenty years, and it exists because women wrote to me and asked for it. I would rather it go to women who will wear it than sit folded in a box.

My granddaughter will not remember this summer. But I will. I will remember making this collection with her asleep on my shoulder, and I would like to think that in thirty years she will find one of these tops in a wardrobe somewhere and know that her grandmother made it for women who had decided they were not finished yet.

The reviews say the same things I have, over and over. 4.7 stars across more than 3,800 women. If you have ever wanted summer clothes that keep you cool without clinging, this is the collection I would put in your hands myself, while the sizes are still there.

— Beatrice

This is a personal letter from the founder of Beatrice & Rose. Prices and availability are accurate while stock lasts.