holiday gift issue 2023
From years of experience.
By Katherine Gillespie, a writer at the Strategist covering outdoors and travel gear. She was previously an editor at Paper.
Illustration: Clara Kirkpatrick
Illustration: Clara Kirkpatrick
Shopping for your partner can be surprisingly fraught — what if you accidentally reveal to the person you’re supposedly closest to that you still don’t really understand their taste after all these years? For advice and reassurance, we turned to five couples who tend to get it right and asked them to talk among themselves about the best gifts they’ve ever given each other. Plus a few duds.
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Linda and John Meyers Stalk Each Other’s eBays
Founders, Wary Meyers
Linda: One year, I was thinking about what to give you, and to get an idea, I went to your eBay watchlist. I saw that you bid on that Burt Reynolds belt buckle. I thought it would be such a nice thing to outbid you on the very thing you wanted. That’s love. Because we work and live together, it can be difficult to create a surprise. eBay is the way to do that — to see what the other person is looking at or bidding on. I’m actually wearing my favorite thing that John ever bought me. There’s an auction house called Hampton Estate Auction. They had this David Webb ring, and I thought it was completely out of our range. But then no one bid. John contacted the auction house and got the ring for me at a very good price, no less. We do also sometimes buy his-and-hers gifts.
John: Like that thing Uten Silo.
L: It’s a space-age organizer from Italy. We got two. For him, a red one, and I got a white one.
J: During COVID, when we’d managed to save a bunch of money, Linda bought me three Guframinis. They’re miniature versions of ’70s furniture.
L: They’re almost more expensive than the actual ’70s furniture, it feels like.
J: These are my favorite things ever. I have all three: a miniature version of the lip sofa, the mini-cactus, and then the Pratone — that’s like a field of grass, but it’s a sofa. Absolutely that and the Uten Silo were my favorite-ever gifts. I also like the Milton Glaser New York poster, which is hanging in our hallway.
L: That was a present from me. But I didn’t know it was from me! He bought it and said it was from me, and there it was, under the tree. If you buy your own gifts, you’re always happy.
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Estelle Bailey-Babenzien and Brendon Babenzien Like Things That Aren’t Practical
Noah co-founder and interior designer; Noah co-founder and J.Crew men’s creative director
Estelle: I have gotten you some classic clothes that you really love.
Brendon: You did get me a Drake’s coat, which is beautiful. I like things that fall out of the category of things I would buy myself. I do know people who would rather have a practical gift; something they would use. But even though you are a phenomenal cook — she can cook anything — if I bought you something for cooking, it would not be received well.
E: I like buying cooking pans for my friends. But from my partner? I want something that’s a little sexier. Like, I got you that snowboard thing. It’s an old-school snowboard with a strap on it.
B: It’s a replica of the original snowboard from Burton. Before they had bindings and stuff. With that original model, you just go to a local hill and try and survive. That was a great gift that’ll get used for a long time.
E: A good present was when you got me the journal, and the gift was that every year you were going to write inside it. It’s a leather book that has a flap in the back so we can keep cards that we’ve written to each other as well. Although we did it for the first few years, now you need to catch up.
B: I think the idea was great. But I haven’t kept up with it.
E: There are still several entries in there! And over time, in years to come, there will be more.
B: Maybe I should keep it bedside so that I write in it more. But then I might start writing stuff at other times, like when we get into a huge fight. “Ah, tonight was terrible!” And then just
date it.
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Laura Chautin and Masami Hosono Go With Everyday Items
Artist and hairstylist
Laura: Masami, I’d say you give more gifts than me.
Masami: I love gifting. I love giving flowers a lot because I love flowers so much in general. I think flowers are so special, and I love sending them to partners. Also just small gifts, like buying a chocolate or, when shopping for myself, noticing something and thinking, Oh, Laura might like this thing. I like giving everyday gifts because it’s easy to forget. Even a vegetable! Maybe Laura wants to eat spinach tomorrow.
L: It’s true that at the farmers’ market, you do go, “I know Laura would like this.”
M: Last year, Laura and her parents and sisters put money together to buy me a rice cooker, which was exactly what I wanted. I’d just used a pot before. Something else that I loved was when Laura booked a really fancy hotel in London for my birthday.
L: The Zetter hotel. It was in an area that I wouldn’t ever stay in, Marylebone, but it’s just very English and I knew Masami would like that.
M: Her first gift to me was beyond: a book of maybe ten pages that she made from special paper, all hand-painted, my favorite food on every single page. A specific matcha ice cream, an orange wine, Pocky, sushi — a specific kind that we’d had together on our first date.
L: It was really extra. Once Masami bought me a necklace and then they wore it every day. And so I was like, “Get me another gift.” So they got the same necklace again. Now we have two of exactly the same necklace.
M: It’s a Simone Rocha necklace, and when I found it in the store, I thought, This is so Laura. It’s so cute and a little fancy. But then I started feeling jealous, like I wanted to wear it. So now I have my own.
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Kristen Stevens and Mike Maggiore Make Lists Throughout the Year
Education-programs manager and artistic director at Film Forum
Mike: I try to listen to my wife when she tells me she likes something or someone. For example, I knew that she was a fan of Stephen Sondheim, and several years ago, for Valentine’s Day, I told her that I’d bought tickets for a show that was in March. And I kind of hinted that I was going to take her to see Cats. And she didn’t know until we got to the theater, but I actually took her to see the revival of Sunday in the Park With George with Jake Gyllenhaal.
Kristen: One thing Mike loves is bourbon and to hunt down good bourbon that’s high priced.
M: It’s called “allocated bourbon,” where stores get only one or two bottles of it.
K: And one time he came home in September and was so excited because our local liquor store had told him they were getting a couple of bottles of Pappy Van Winkle’s bourbon. They told him that they’d put his name and number on a list and would call him when it came in. So I went to the store and asked them to call me instead. I got the bottle, then gave it to him for Christmas.
M: I couldn’t believe it. One other example I’d use of listening well is that for many years, Kristen, who is from Ohio, would rave to me about one of these local ice creams she loved, called Graeter’s, that’s very hard to find in New York. I found some on Goldbelly and had it shipped in dry ice.
K: Mike and I have a lot of different interests. We had a big argument about The Sound of Music recently. He hates it; I love it. And I couldn’t find it on streaming. So Mike was in a used-record store the other day and he got the DVD for us. He was like, “If this doesn’t show my love …”
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Mara Hoffman and Javier Piñón Give the Gift of Quality Time
Mara: Jav is an incredible collage artist, and he will usually make me a gift that’s a piece of art, which I always love.
Javier: The first gift I gave Mara was a collage of her at the time. She was like no one I’d ever met before and had this sense of the exotic and mythical. So I made it in the style of an old circus announcement of a snake lady. There was a beautiful dancer and she’s resting on a bed of snakes. Her arms are upraised and snakes are entwining her arms. There was a banner over her. I forget exactly what it said. Mara, do you remember?
M: It just said “Mara.” Very soon after we met, I went to India by myself. I was supposed to go for a month, but I left a little early because we were totally falling in love. And when I came home, he had hung the collage in my apartment. And it was so beautiful, just this affirmation of what was unfolding for us. This is all sounding so crazy and corny, but we also met on Valentine’s Day. So that was always a theme for us. Near the beginning of the relationship, I made him a valentine. He’d told me this story of being in Mexico City years before and he’d met a medicine woman or somebody who created spells, and they gave him a bird. What was the bird, Jav?
J: A hummingbird.
M: They’d given him a hummingbird to hold or wear that would help him attract his mate. So I made him this piece — I had found some bird feathers and I glued them onto a heart. Doesn’t that sound so ridiculous? But, yes, we are two artists who fell in love. Since Javier is not someone who wants to acquire things, it can almost feel like a burden to him. We’ve shifted into experiences. We make a trip a gift to each other. Going somewhere is going to be something that means a lot more to both of us. Then the things that we really need, we go out and get for ourselves. As a family, we have a really special love for Costa Rica. All three of us are beach lovers and have always chosen tropical getaways over anything else. One of our favorite gift trips was to Nosara, where we stayed at the Nosara Beach Hotel for the first half and then an Airbnb the second half of the trip. It was for my birthday and way better than receiving any material gift.
J: I don’t do it often, but in the early years, I was taking quick mental notes and snapshots of anything that caught Mara’s eye, that she might have commented on. And I’ve caught you off guard, Mara. Once, we were on a trip somewhere, and you liked something in a store. I circled back and got it, and held onto it for months until Christmas came around. And all of a sudden this thing was, again, from some other place. I remember it was a sweater. It might have been in Mexico. I can’t remember now; do you remember, Mara? A black piece.
M: No. Now, I’m really the worst. I know that I loved it.
From $25
From $25
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