As I sat down to interview Love Island winners Toni Laites and Cach Mercer on a grey, rain-soaked Friday afternoon, I couldn’t help but wonder what a Miami native really makes of British weather and why on earth she chose to stay. In a global, work-from-anywhere age, surely you don’t need to swap sunshine for drizzle, or spend half the year in darkness, unless the pull is genuinely strong. It took barely five minutes into our call to realise that, for Toni, it absolutely is.
I’d been warned the interview would be camera off. With a sick child at home, I was secretly relieved and dialled in bare-faced, not even checking whether my camera was set up properly. When the screen flickered on, Laites appeared relaxed, hair piled on top of her head, no airs or graces, curled up next to Mercer on the sofa. I smiled instantly. There was nothing performative about them. No switched-on “public couple” energy, just two people very comfortably themselves. So I stayed au naturel too and, within moments, we were chatting like old friends.
Officially, we were there to talk about their partnership with eBay. The pair are co-hosting an eBay Live event on Friday 13th March at 3pm, auctioning off a mix of their own personal pieces alongside some of the most memorable pre-loved looks worn in the Love Island villa. All proceeds will go to Great Ormond Street Hospital and it quickly becomes clear that this is not just a neat brand alignment, but a central reason they said yes.
“Having a platform means nothing if you’re not using it for good.”
The charity element of the event feels like a natural extension. Both Cach and Toni are ambassadors for different causes, but they wanted to come together on something shared. “Having a platform means nothing if you’re not using it for good,” Cach tells me. Toni is equally direct. “I can tell people what lip liner I’m wearing all day, but I actually want to make a difference.” For her, charity was never a bolt-on or a box-tick. It was central to why the collaboration mattered. “We’re doing okay right now,” she says simply. “It means more to see the money go to someone who needs it.” It is a refreshingly clear-eyed take that recognises comfort as responsibility, not entitlement. It can often sound a bit false when celebrities claim not to use their visibility purely for self-gain, but I believe them.
Fashion, unsurprisingly, is where the conversation naturally flows. Cach admits he went into the villa wildly underprepared, wardrobe-wise, not expecting to last very long. “If the eBay pre-loved stuff hadn’t been there, I genuinely wouldn’t have had much to wear,” he laughs. What surprised him most was the sheer range, from vintage jackets to designer pieces, and the freedom it gave him to still dress like himself. Even though all the Islanders had access to the same wardrobe, everyone styled the pieces differently. “I might wear a shirt one night and someone else would wear it completely differently the next. That was the fun part.”
For both of them, the Love Island experience completely shifted how they viewed pre-loved clothing; eBay meant electronics and collectables, not one-off amazing pieces. Post-villa, it is where he now looks first. “Anyone can buy fast fashion,” he says. “It takes a certain eye to find a really good vintage piece.” He is particularly passionate about older jackets, the cut, the quality and the fact that they are not made like that anymore. “Those pieces have history. They’ve lived lives before us and they’ll keep going after.”
Image Source: eBay
Toni, meanwhile, was unfazed by the villa’s nightly dress-up culture. Having lived in Miami and Vegas, heels and glam were already part of her normal rhythm. “Love Island clothes were basically my clothes,” she shrugs. The real culture shock came afterwards, landing in London and realising that her style and British weather do not quite cater to sequins. “Coats ruin outfits,” she says, only half joking.
She admits the strangest part of the transition has not been the weather, but the visibility. Being recognised constantly in a country that is not hers is something she is still adjusting to, a reminder that the move was not just geographic, but it’s personal too.
Watching the show back now, both admit they see it from a different perspective. “It’s very different. We’re producers now in our heads,” says Cach. They notice repeated outfits, recognise pieces, even ones they wore themselves, and laugh at how those clothes quietly tell stories. What once felt like pure spectacle now feels more considered and more layered, which in many ways mirrors how they are approaching life outside the villa.
“Everyone has a social battery and if you’re not being authentic, it runs out a lot quicker.”
That self-awareness comes up again when we talk about authenticity and the pressure to perform once the cameras are gone. Cach is clear that trying to be anything other than yourself is a short-term strategy at best. “Everyone has a social battery,” he says, “and if you’re not being authentic, it runs out a lot quicker.” It is advice he would give to anyone going into the villa now. Don’t pre-empt success, don’t play a role, and don’t try to be the ‘good guy’ or the ‘perfect girl’. “Go in as your complete self,” he adds. “If people connect with you, it should be the real version, because that’s the one you have to live with afterwards.” In a world that rewards performance, it is a surprisingly grounded take, and one that feels especially rare coming from someone who has been through reality TV’s most intense pressure cooker.
And then there is Cach himself. As a mother of a son, I don’t say this lightly, but if there were ever a case for getting a man into schools to teach young boys how to act, speak and show up, this is it. Thoughtful, emotionally articulate, generous with credit and quietly respectful, he is, in internet terms, a walking green flag. The kind you hope your children grow up around. He is everything we have been told Love Island men are not supposed to be.
As for Toni and the UK weather, she still hates it. The cold, the rain, the darkness, none of it appears to have grown on her, but that isn’t stopping her. “Work is here. Cach is here. My friends are here. So I’m where I’m meant to be,” she says.
It appears there is something to beat the winter blues after all.
The event will stream on eBay’s immersive live shopping experience, eBay Live, on Friday 13 February at 3PM GMT. Fans can tune into eBay Live via the eBay App. Use the navigation pill on the homepage to find the eBay Live page. Sign up now to set a reminder.
Lauren Ezekiel is a former associate editor at PS UK, where she writes about all things beauty and wellness. With a degree in journalism she began her career in 2008. Lauren is obsessed with skincare, hair and makeup. A mum of two, Lauren is an advocate for the benefits of beauty and self-care for your mental well-being, which inspired her award-winning charity initiative We C U 2020. Her work has been published in Grazia, OK!, Health & Beauty, The Sun, Asda, Dare and Metro.
