How To Summer Like Dua Lipa
Every it-girl wants a Dua Lipa summer. And how could you not?
She made the case for us this spring by getting married three times, more or less. A London courthouse in custom Schiaparelli, then a reported two-million-dollar, three-day blowout in Palermo in a backless Bottega Veneta gown with a jeweled Bulgari watch on each wrist. By July those looks will have trickled down to every feed, every group chat, and every girl packing for a weekend that is not, in fact, in Sicily. What we're really after this summer isn't the price tags or the paparazzi stalking our every move though, it's the vibe that Dua Lipa carries.
She can stand in front of a 16th-century palazzo dripping in citrine and rubellite and still read as a girl who threw something on and wandered toward the sea. The look is mostly silhouette and attitude, both of which are entirely attainable, which is exactly why we think it's about to be everywhere.
What the season is going to look like
White will run it. Clean girls everywhere are cheering; I can hear it now. The hero piece is the white lace slip dress, already crowned the dress of 2026 by Who What Wear and worn on repeat by every it-girl from Dakota Fanning to Zoë Kravitz. Dua's version of it is the one that's going to set the tone. Around it, expect crochet, the open-knit kind that looks handmade by somebody's Italian grandmother, anything backless, and a sheer beach dress thrown over a swimsuit.
The accessories will carry most of the look: gold hoops big enough to be spotted across the street, a silk scarf knotted at the neck or the wrist or the handle of a bag, leather sandals that look like they've walked on real cobblestones, and sunglasses the size of small dinner plates. The palette stays tight on white, cream, brown, and one shot of tomato red. Dua's Bluemarine number helped kick off the tomato-girl thing a few years back, and a single saturated red against a tan reads effortless in a way a busy print never will.
In the end though, it all comes down to one word, which is Sicily. Now, you don't need to literally be there, but you do need to exude the feeling of being somewhere warm with no agenda and looking expensive without looking like you tried. Easy enough, right?
Her love life is part of the brand
You can't sell a Dua Lipa summer without the romance, which happens to be the most on-brand thing about her. She and actor Callum Turner fell for each other over a book, specifically Trust by Hernán Díaz. They'd been introduced once at the River Café in London and nothing came of it. A year later their paths crossed at a dinner in L.A., he asked what she was reading, and it was the exact novel he was halfway through. She's called it a "Sliding Doors moment," and it couldn't be cuter.
Their Sicilian wedding featured a library display of colorful books as a nod to how they met. A literary meet-cute that ends in a Bottega gown in Palermo is almost insultingly cinematic. The rest of us may not be getting the romance-movie version this summer, but the romance part is still on the table, man or not.
Single? Maybe this is the season to engineer your own meet-cute, or at minimum get back on Raya. Dating? Retire the dinner-and-a-movie rotation that's gone stale and plan something that scares you a little. Married and feeling more like roommates than soulmates? Put the kind of effort into your husband that you've been pouring into that needlepoint canvas. And if none of that is where you are right now, romanticizing the mundane is still very much the move, which is the whole Dua principle anyway: she makes the ordinary look like it's worth photographing.
That only works if you're actually looking, though, which brings us to the part nobody's going to put in the shopping guides. She's barely on her phone. The woman runs Service95, an entire editorial platform, plus a book club she launched in 2023 that's now a podcast and got her named guest curator of the 2026 London Literature Festival. She's famously, almost aggressively analog. As in, she reads on tour buses and fell in love over a paperback. None of that has anything to do with clothes, but it might be the part that actually sticks: fewer hours hunched over a screen, more long lunches that drift into the afternoon, an actual book in the actual bag (a must if you're committing to the bit), hair left to dry in salt water instead of fought with, the impractical dress worn to the very normal dinner. The aesthetic falls apart the second you're doomscrolling at the table, so put the phone in the bag and leave it there.
The essentials, and where to actually get them
Now the honest math. Dua's real closet is Chloé white lace, crochet from Jacquemus, Pucci, and The Attico, Bulgari gold, oversized Chanel sunglasses, and a woven basket bag or quilted Chanel on her shoulder. It's gorgeous. But it's also a down payment on a really expensive house. The good news is that the look lives in the silhouette far more than the logo, which is why it's going to work so well for us everyday girls this summer.
The foundation. Start with one good white knit or slip and let it carry the rest. Reformation makes the body-skimming white-knit top she actually wears off-duty; the Vanessa knit is $78 and a very similar version has been ID'd on her own Instagram. For something with more nightlife in it, Kim Shui ($320 to $395) and Fancì Club (around $460) do the sexy, body-conscious dresses she gravitates toward, and Dua was early to the Fancì Club aesthetic before it went viral. For the tomato-red moment without the Bluemarine price, the Susmies Isabela red top ($83) is a cool, low-key European pick.
Show Me Your Mumu Celine Dress, $248
Peixoto Farrah Lace Trim Mini Dress, $178
Selfie Leslie Must Be Love Lace Maxi Dress White, $90
Superdown Dovie Drape Mini Dress, $96
Reformation Vanessa Knit Top, $58
Frankies Bikinis Julie Crochet Coverup, $225
The hoops. Skip the Bulgari fantasy. Dua's affordable gold of choice is Tom Wood, the Norwegian label behind her sculptural Ice Hoops and Nova Hoops, with Missoma for delicate everyday pieces. When she wants something playful and a little '00s, she reaches for Bea Bongiasca's enamel. For attainable stacking rings and bangles, Jenny Bird ($128 to $298), Martha Calvo earrings (around $105 to $140), and Australian brand Dinosaur Designs ($75 to $105) all sit in her orbit.
Jennifer Fisher 1" Samira Hinged Mini Hoops, $350
Tom Wood Ice Hoops Medium Gold, $489
Ross Simons 3.50 Carat Bezel-Set CZ Ring in 18kt Gold Over Sterling, $110
Missoma Box Link Double Chain Necklace, $189
Jenny Bird Dane Anklet Stack, $212
Ettika Smooth Cuff Bracelet, $70
Wolf & Badger Articulated Gold Fish Dangle Drop Long Earrings, $310
Ettika Rising Tide Pearl Studs, $55
The sandals. This is where you can spend almost nothing. The genuinely cheap, genuinely Dua option is Havaianas, specifically the Brazil Logo or the slimmer Slim style, both in the $25 to $35 range. A step up, she's worn Coperni platform flip-flops for the beach and The Attico's Selene leather thong sandals with a tank dress on holiday. For something more elevated, Andrea Wazen does the strappy flats and sandals she's worn abroad, and she arrived in Palermo for the wedding weekend in Gucci kitten-heeled flip-flops that read more travel sandal than stiletto.
Havaianas Women's Slim Flip Flops, $34
MIA Niccola Platform Wedge Thong Sandal, $60
Sam Edelman Ellina Strappy Flat Sandal, $100
Everything else. A woven or crochet bag by day, a "funmaxxing" statement bag by night. Sunglasses are black, always. Sometimes Celine, sometimes Saint Laurent. Makeup kept to almost nothing and a sun-flushed cheek from the Italian sun. Keep your hair loose and a little undone, because the moment it looks done, the whole "effortless chic" effect is gone.
Celine Triomphe 15 Sunglasses in Acetate, $550
Saint Laurent SL 276 MICA, $277
Anthropologie Crochet Top Handle Bag, $98
Ready to have a Dua Lipa summer? Here's the forecast in one line: one white dress, gold hoops, cheap good flip-flops, a tan, and a book you actually intend to finish. We'll see you out there. Buy the dress now, before everyone else does.