William Giraldi on life as a bookish bodybuilder: ‘It’s a poisoned way to be a man’

As a teenager, William Giraldi would pump himself full of steroids, hit the gym ... and secretly read Keats. His new memoir examines the absurdities of modern masculinity and envisages a better world in which his sons don’t get caught in its toxic grip

What I’m really thinking: the woman with a big nose

You know what people are thinking when they see you for the first time. There might even be a visible double take

Tight squeeze: why muscly men love ultra-skinny jeans

Gym life, Instagram and the male cast of Love Island have all cemented the unceasing trend for neo-jeggings. Will it ever wear off?

Lydia Towsey: how I discovered the Venus in me

From Botticelli to glossy magazines, women have been idealised and misrepresented for centuries. Performance poet Lydia Towsey reveals how her own near-fatal eating disorder set her on a path to explore new ways of looking at female bodies

Gemma Arterton reveals studio filmed her exercising to make her lose weight for role

Actor describes ‘traumatic’ experience at the hands of producers who flew out a personal trainer to Morocco and filmed her at the gym to prove she was exercising

Worried about your odour? At least a machine will tell you straight

A few years ago freelance journalist Nell Frizzell lost her sense of smell for 18 months. Now there’s an app to help you find out if you stink

No sweat: app aims to alert office workers when they start to stink

Japanese developers say device could help bring end to ‘sumehara’, or ‘smell harassment’, by those who disturb colleagues with their body odour

School clamps down on phones and Fitbits to ease body image worries

Stroud high school for girls says tech gadgets and social media exacerbate pressures leading to low self-esteem

Chloë Grace Moretz ‘appalled and angry’ over body-shaming poster

The billboard for the actor’s new animated film Red Shoes and the Seven Dwarfs has attracted criticism for its beauty standards message

Yes, Barbie has got bigger. But her old body-image message endures

The Fashionista range is meant to depict ‘ordinary’ women, but my daughter’s reaction shows that the original, abnormally thin Barbie is still idealised

OurChemist

Our Chemist – Health