My Gifts for Your People
The Third and Best Installment of the Grudge Report Gift Guide
$250-$500. 44 year old husband living in Boerum Hill Brooklyn. Really great cook but Just married so have a ton of new stuff for very tiny apartment. Loves running and skiing -- has a ton, like a ton, of running shoes and gear already. Wants to leave city. No pets or kids yet.
Leave your apartment and enjoy being untethered to responsibilities at home and treat him to two nights at Eastwind in the Catskills. You can even ski in the area should winter ever return!
From $129 a night at Mr. and Mrs. Smith
My impossible to shop for father: 72 year old former Deadhead, career Tech corporate lawyer who became a Burning Man devotee in his 60s and drives a Tesla model Y because he "likes to sit up high." Has 1M physical music storage devices (vinyl, CDs, tapes!) he rarely listens to but won't get rid of. Plays electric bass. Has enough money to comfortably buy everything he wants, and does. His favorite store (place?) is Costco, and he's known to visit the local one where ever he travels to buy a bottle of tequila to drink back at the air bnb to save money. Truly adoring grandfather to one toddler, lifelong world traveler, local news and non fiction book afficionado. Also: war history buff, extremely competitive board game player (to the point it's not fun to play with him) likes a good puzzle. Still fixes things for his daughters when he visits our homes.
Budget! $50-$120
What a dad. Incredible. He’s an Alexander Payne character. I love an elder Burner who loves his grandkid and and won’t listen to his own music because it’s all analog. Take him into this century with a comfortable hint of nostalgia and give him this waterproof, portable Marshall speaker that can come along with him on his travels. It’s even Muddy-Playa-resistant.
$99.99 from MoMA Store
My Jewish mother. IMPOSSIBLE to gift for. Relies on me (35 year old daughter) for "what's trendy" fashion wise but is very particular (i.e., most cashmere is too itchy, will not wear brown). Petite, so that's a whole other shopping challenge. Likes cycling, walking, redecorating, and emailing me articles about harmful air quality in NYC in a never ending attempt to get me to move to the suburbs to be closer to her. $75-$150.
I know this person. I was raised by and amongst these people. I am destined to become this person. She wants you to be HAPPY. Failing that, a spa day with you in the city at Elizabeth Arden would have been perfect, but it closed, so instead, a very fashion-mom-approved AERIN frame with a picture of the two of you in it. She can tell it all about the superior air quality in the suburbs and leave you choking to death on smog in peace.
$125 from Aerin
Close friend since childhood. She is a jewelry designer who has been called (by a certain fashion forward independent publication) “the queen of chic.” We are like sisters. Impeccable doesn’t even come close to describing the editorial eye she keeps on her surroundings and the clothes her children wear. You, Bess, may or may not have some of her pieces. I think you may have mentioned her by name in a story about fancy Brooklyn moms. She loves to read and loves vintage clothes ‘n’ things, society gossip books, and Eve Babitz. She is Jewish and has been described as looking like “a young Lauren Hutton.” In short, she’s fucking cool. What do you get for this person?!
Budget:$5-$50
Good luck!
I’ve been trying to Venn Diagram who this is for 15 minutes and I think I know who you’re talking about (Initials RV?), so I won’t recommend her own products, which I’ve perhaps also listed in a gift guide? For the vintage-loving aesthete with a flair for dramatic ladies of history and a $50 budget, this archival Mosser trinket dish feels like the kind of thing she wouldn’t buy for herself, but would hope a best friend gets for her (I like it in Jade):
I need to know who this cool jewelry mom is. Does it affect my life? Not at all. Can I stop googling to try to guess it? Nopers. I CANNOT HANDLE UNSOLVED MYSTERIES.
You are a national treasure. SB.