I love beautiful things. My career has been built in making, selling, and appreciating them, and my home is full of them. I also love giving gifts – but my appreciation for beautiful, permanent, slightly frivolous objects doesn’t mean I think everyone needs another one.

Especially in cities, apartments are tiny. Drawers are full. There’s no accounting for taste, and there’s literally no room for error when space is so limited.

And now it’s the holidays, and suddenly everything is marketed as a gift, and most things aren’t. We’re wary of it, we’re exhausted, and it feels like one more thing to do. We also aren’t all wealthy, so we don’t want to go broke trying to prove that we love who we love and we appreciate who we appreciate.

A few years ago, I wrote down some guidelines for gifting for my mother, who has a small panic every year about trying to get gifts “right.” With Black Friday weekend upon us, I’m revisiting them.

We all know the pain of the problem gift: bizarre objects we've received from people we truly adore. These are things we can't part with because of the sentiment, but can't use because of the disconnect – things that end up in a closet or a drawer to remind us every so often of our own awkward situation.

But when gifts are done well, we love getting them. We feel loved, and appreciated, and seen. We feel cared for. We feel important. Most importantly, we need the joy. We actually need it.

So here we are. The rules.

Most gifts should be consumable.

I’m not talking about gifts for your nearest and dearest; those you love and cherish – I’m talking about the bulk of your list. Your co-workers, your team, your favorite barista. People ALWAYS need thoughtful consumables, where they may never need another permanent object.

Things I like for this are candles, wine (or non-alcoholic aperitifs!), anything in a tin or jar, and homemade food. Or, obviously, Baby le Bébé (more on that later.)

A gift I’ve been giving all year is bread. I bake three times a week for the town, and for my friends I’ll do single loaves in flavors that remind me of their taste, and leave them on their doorstep or, if they leave their homes unlocked, in their kitchen on the counter.

They know it was me – my bread is a signature, and it’s something everyone knows and appreciates.

I also love giving our bath and body oils, lip balms, and winter balm – body and lip products are less intimate than what goes into our daily facial rituals, but are gifts that take care of the recipient and nourish them. I personally feel that daily facial care should be a personal decision, but a body or bath product can be a delightful gift.

For me, that’s Smoothing Body Oil for girlfriends, and Skin Saver Winter Balm for colleagues. Useful things, with a little pleasure built in.

Take hints.

This is self explanatory. Some people love to hint. For many of those people, the ability to have control over their experience is also a HUGE HUGE IMPORTANT GIFT. Give them the gift of showing them that you listen. Please take the hints.

Oh my god, the experience!

YES to experiences. Yes to movie tickets, yes to road trips, yes to ice skating. Yes to a sewing lesson, a cooking lesson, a hike, a spa day. Spend the day together. Take the time to enjoy and experience not only what you've gone off and done, but to experience EACH OTHER.  Our time is limited, and it is a gift. Give it.  More practically, experiences have the added bonus of not taking up space in an apartment.

Budget does not equal success.

“Buy less, buy better, and buy wisely” applies always.

Thought matters more than money: If you’re on a budget, a four-dollar tin of the dolmas that you truly love, and a couple of pieces of your favorite pretty little candies along with a note explaining that you’ve become obsessed with this stuff lately, and you hope your friend is too, is not inherently less of a gift than a hundred-dollar bottle of wine.

The note, the expression of connection and care, changes a modest gift from something that fulfills an obligation, to something thoughtful and sweet. I love dolmas. I love dolmas even more with a bow and a note. I love being REMEMBERED.

My friends once mailed me a jar of walnut spread they made after I gave them some surplus walnuts I had, and I literally SQUEALED at how clever and sweet this was.

OH MY GOD. SO CLEVER. SO SEEN.

At the end of the day, no one needs to be overwhelmed by a gift. They just need to feel seen.

Be sweet.

We have covered our acquaintances, colleagues, friends, and those near and dear who love to drop hints. For the rest of our list – those closest to us, who we love and cherish, and for whom we want to express that sentiment – do not fall into the trap of asking yourself “what would they want?” It’s an impossible question to answer unless you ask them. If you ask, and they know? Great. See tip two, and take the hint.

However, if you aren’t asking, or they don’t know (many people don’t!), just be sweet. Go straight to thoughtful and sweet. Do not dawdle in any other realm.

The specific roadmap is as follows: think of your person – the things they love, the way they spend their time, and their inherent qualities. Do not skip the inherent qualities – perpetually cold friends need warm things, perpetually hot friends need cold things. Perpetually stressed friends need stress relief, and perpetually twitchy friends need things to fidget with.

Then, tap into your own experience of that person, and where their inherent qualities intersect with the things they love.

I made a pan of sourdough citrus sticky buns for a good friend for her birthday – they didn’t even last the trip home from our local bar.

This friend is a creative, both professionally and personally, and I know she loves fruit bakes (she’s a pie queen!) – plus, what’s seasonal and accessible out here is a big driving factor. Sumac is wild here, and I dry it, so I started there, with its citrusy profile, then built out a citrus, sumac, and saffron flavor around that note.

For someone else, it might be a completely different gift.

Take a voracious reader, who loves all things old, to the rare book room at the Strand, and have a gift certificate already ready and waiting in your wallet. Wrap your perpetually cold loved one with an eye for luxury in a beautifully made blanket, or your perpetually cold loved one who cannot get enough of cute characters in a fun one printed with their favorite Sanrio character.

My point here is that we take the person and their daily experience into account, and then the gift reveals itself in the analysis.

A particularly favorite gift I have given more than one hoodie-wearing friend is a hoodie that I embroidered, covering the back with things that reminded me of the person. They were always worn until they were worn out.

That’s what I’m hoping for when I give something: that it becomes part of someone’s life, gets used, gets loved, gets eaten before it even makes it home.

Wishing you luck with your gifting. Be sweet. Take the hints.

xx
Remy