Alan Carr
I’ve got this new app called ChirpOMatic which identifies different birdsong. Melanie Sykes told me about it. We went for a walk and she held it up and said, “Oooh there’s a blackbird. There’s a buzzard.” It will change your life, whether you’re a bird fanatic or not.
Mary Berry
What makes my summer? Being at home on a hot, sunny day, in the garden with family, dogs and a chilled glass of sauvignon blanc.
The new edition of Mary Berry’s Baking Bible (Ebury) is out now
Annie Mac
Getting the ferry from Holyhead in Wales to Ireland is a summer essential. It typifies everything that’s important to me as an immigrant. The biggest thing I can give my kids is a sense of Irish identity, so every year we spend a month seeing family, sitting on the beach in our raincoats, our lips turning blue. It’s part of their youth and a really huge deal for me.
Sami Tamimi
I love early summer suppers in the garden, moving the cooking outdoors with my Big Green Egg barbecue. To drink: homemade lemonade with fresh mint and lots of ice.
Jay Blades
Something He Can Feel by Aretha Franklin always reminds me of summer. Aretha is talking about a guy, but for me it’s about how the sun feels on your skin; it’s just sublime and beautiful. When we play it at home, that is summer for me.
Watch Jay Blades: History of the East End on Channel 5
Joe Lycett
I have one friend I contact when the sun is shining with the simple message: “Might it be gavi weather?” This is my bat-signal to blue skies: it is imperative that we open a bottle of something crisp. What ensues is golden hours of lingering boozy chats, the familiar smell of factor 50, a slice of cucumber, a fist fight and a sticky cuddle.
Maya Jama
The best thing about summer is Notting Hill carnival. I spent many years on the steps at home in Ladbroke Grove celebrating it with my friends, soaking in the music, the dancing, the culture, the vibes – a really good time.
Host of Love Island, on ITV now
Adam Kay
I’ve always hated summer. Ever since I was a teenager it has been a streaming- eyed, blotchy-faced festival of sneezing I’ve done my best to opt out of. Then a couple of years ago I was referred to an allergy specialist who took a spray out of her magic cabinet and taught me to use it properly, which apparently no one does (don’t sniff as you squirt, use right hand for left nostril and vice versa). And I haven’t sneezed since! My summers are now a 99-eating, lido-splashing, linen-shirted season of unbridled joy. It’s called Avamys and they’re not even paying me to say this. Then again, nor are the Guardian.
Sophie Ellis-Bextor
Like a true Brit, my summer is made when we get the chance to have a barbecue in the garden. In our house this can happen any time the sun shines from April to October, but it makes most sense in the summer. Barbecue in motion, sun cream on, cocktail in hand, family all around, sun in the sky … it’s summertime!
Laura Jackson
This summer, I am enjoying turning my garden into an extension of my home and transforming the space into a stylish sanctuary for me and the family. I’m entertaining, planting fresh summer veg, getting into garden shed DIY, even building my own pizza oven. Why would I ever need to leave?
Host of So, How Do You… The Interiors Podcast in partnership with Wickes
Elizabeth Day
I should say something lyrical like smelling freshly cut grass in the park mingled with coconut-scented suntan lotion. But the truth is, the thing that makes my summer is the new series of Love Island. Those opening chords transport me straight to light-filled evenings and sundowner Aperol spritzes. It’s how I mark the change in seasons: as soon as I see rippled abdominal muscles and hear a twentysomething model-slash-estate agent say, “They’re my type on paper”, I know summer has arrived.
