When the French interior designer Camille Vergnes throws a dinner party in Paris, she opts for unfussy white table linens and white plates. This allows her Art Deco-style set of serving spoons, salad servers and carving knives, all with almond green shagreen handles, to take center stage. “I use [the serving set] as the key piece of the table along with the flowers or candleholders,” she says. Vergnes’s approach reflects a shift in focus when it comes to tableware, away from handblown glassware and patterned napkins to sculptural utensils. In Copenhagen, stirred by her homeland’s history of silversmithing, the Danish jeweler Olga Bonne has added delicate hand-wrought silver spoons, forks and knives with handles in the shape of fish, kestrels or hares to her roster of whimsical creations. She takes inspiration from eras past, “when arts and crafts did not have to be functional but most of all ornamental and extravagant,” she says. Some designers are marrying the functional and fanciful: In Brighton, the British designer Alessandra Williams recently launched her namesake homeware label with sets of hand-carved salad servers in green leopard stone and blackened jacaranda wood made by Fair Trade co-operatives in Zimbabwe and Nairobi. Frank Traynor, the United States-based artist behind the Perfect Nothing Catalog, adorns everything from cheese graters to cake knives with copper and tin combined with semiprecious stones and shells, lending quotidian objects new charm. Then there’s the British chef and farmer Ben Bodman, who makes carbon Damascus steel knives with swirling patterns on the blades and myrtlewood and rosewood handles in Melksham, a small town in Wiltshire, England, under the label Bodman Blades. Presented to a hostess in lieu of a bottle of wine, these are practical gifts that will pull double duty as décor.
top shelf
Feast-Worthy Ferments
Good houseguests help restock the pantry instead of just depleting it — the best ones bring provisions that will last long after they leave. Look for fermented foodstuffs with a sense of place: There’s Mimi Ferment’s beetroot miso, a fruity, fuchsia-colored condiment that’s made in Berlin with beets from Germany, rice from Italy and sea salt from Majorca, all aged in red wine barrels. Yesfolk’s kombucha vinegar is made from yaupon plants, a type of holly native to Texas. Alexandra’s Pikliz (pronounced “pick-lees”) is a bracingly spicy chile relish inspired by the Haitian condiment that Alexandra Marie-Jude Roumain Baker grew up eating with her family. Yumé Boshi’s minty Red Shiso Syrup is made in Oakland, Calif., by Ayako Iino, who studied traditional preservation techniques in a rural village in Japan. The tartness and color of these ferments elevate conventional party fare: Add the pickles to a cheese board; splash the syrup in a cocktail; whisk funky vinegar into a dressing. Finally, for a friend who’s foregoing alcohol, bring along a bottle of Snow Chrysanthemum, a floral and delicate kombucha that makes a flavorful alternative to natural wine.
I once returned from a trip to Woodstock, in upstate New York, with a large metal wind chime, only to discover that its sound, which had been calming in the open spaces of the Catskills, was a noise complaint waiting to happen in Brooklyn. A wind bell, however, which is generally smaller and quieter, is just as appealing when hung beside the door of a city balcony as from the porch of a country house. Typically composed of a single metal or glass bell and a dangling sail, these instruments have long been popular in Japan, where they’re often found in temples. The Los Angeles home goods store the Good Liver sells bronze versions made by Nousaku, a Takaoka, Japan-based company that was founded in 1609 and specializes in Buddhist altar fittings. The petite cast-iron one by the Yamagata-based Chushin Kobo workshop and this bamboo-framed tabletop design made in Shizuoka also reference Japanese craft traditions. And I’ve long coveted one of the bells handmade by artisans in Arcosanti, the unfinished experimental Arizona desert town founded by the Italian architect Paolo Soleri in 1970. Even in the cooler months, these ornaments are a reminder of warm breezes and time spent with friends outdoors.
square Roots
Quilts for Long, Lazy Summer Days
Whether strewn across a couch, used as summer bedding or for picnics on the beach, a cotton quilt is an endlessly versatile gift. In a modern take on the squares traditionally sewn together to make blankets, New York’s Thompson Street Studio uses cotton and linen fabrics, leftover from its custom projects, in its geometric Clove quilt. It can also be hung as wall décor, thanks to a removable fabric panel on the back. For the traditionalist, this 100 percent cotton quilt from the Japanese brand BasShu recalls American ones made in the early 1900s. Pendleton’s leans classic as well, and is made with an airy cotton matelassé, making it well-suited for warm nights. For your friend who’s notoriously indecisive, one side of the Italian designer Lisa Corti’s Indian block-printed floral quilt is a subtle cranberry stripe, while the opposite embraces a clash of mustard, teal, royal blue and pink under bold clusters of marigolds. Also block-printed in India is Nickey Kehoe’s lap quilt, which uses a checkerboard pattern inspired by the sugar cubes served at a high tea the designers Todd Nickey and Amy Kehoe experienced while traveling the country. The Agnes patchwork quilt from Nordic home textiles brand Projekti Tyyny, which aims to “revolutionize sofa sitting,” is plush and feminine. For a truly heirloom-worthy piece, Gee’s Bend quilts are textile masterpieces that have been a tradition in Boykin, Ala., since the 1800s, when enslaved women would make abstract free-form designs using fabric scraps. The techniques have been passed down through generations, and a selection of the quilts can be found by scouring Etsy shops started by quilters themselves.
Bubble Wrap
A Simple Solution for Restless Kids (or Cats)
Whether the occasion is a summer barbecue or a weekend away with friends, panic usually sets in before any event that includes my children. I was (and still am) convinced my kids will be the ones causing chaos or having the “I’m bored, I want to go home” breakdown. So perhaps selfishly rooted in the preservation of my sanity, my go-to host gift is bubbles: simple, inexpensive and sure to entertain kids as well as amuse adults. Bubble Tree multipacks are great ice-breakers, perfect to unite children who may not know one another. The company makes a refillable system with aluminum bottles and space to I.D. the bottles in order to avoid fights over ownership. Pustefix is a classic and its bottles work well as table favors, even if there are no offspring around — but at the kids’ table, a bubble moment is a welcome diversion for any picky eater. Far Out Bubbles are gigantic showstoppers that will bring everyone to attention during a lull or while your host is occupied. For the weekend away, Moulin Routy’s pretty giant bubble gift box would be nice to unwrap at any gathering — and with an assortment of wands, the fun is meant to last. And don’t forget the cat lover: Catit makes bubbles with catnip oil that will hopefully bring Fluffy out from his hiding place under the bed.
While your host probably has an abundance of bowls and a classic serving tray, they’re less likely to have an oyster plate. The California-based Rex Design offers a hand-painted fluted-edge ceramic style that can serve up to eight oysters and a dollop of cocktail sauce in the center. For a more homespun option, the artist Michele Mirisola of Chell Fish releases delightfully illustrated platters in limited batches every month, made from epoxy clay and real oyster shells covered in a food-safe resin (she accepts D.M.s for custom orders for any designs that are sold out at her web shop). There’s a plate for the stark minimalist, as well — a milky white Victorian era-inspired porcelain platter from the Brooklyn artist Virginia Sin. The Florida-based brand Coton Colors makes a $40 ceramic plate with a beautifully detailed underside that echoes the mollusks’ textured exteriors. And when they’re not being used for oysters, these plates are aptly designed for arranging aperitivo snacks, crudités and dips.
Give a Hand
Beautifully Designed Card Decks
The old saying goes that you must accept and play with the cards life has dealt you. But why not ensure a fortuitous hand with an artistically designed deck? Hermès’s version, which was conceived by the artist and silk scarf designer Jan Bajtlik, is an ode to the posters of the Polish School from the ’50s and ’70s. Named the Cheval de Fête, the deck’s design centers on an abstract drawing of a horse’s head, which reflects the vibrant colors, geometric shapes and clean lines Warsaw artists used to illustrate films, plays, concerts and art exhibitions during a defining era for graphic design. Paying tribute to a different aesthetic of the same era, NASA’s playing cards showcase artwork from its archives to celebrate the “worm” logotype, which was originally created in the ’70s by the graphic design studio Danne & Blackburn when it rebranded the space agency. Liberty also designed a deck of playing cards that draws upon its archive: In the British brand’s iteration, a foil-stamped drawer box presents two decks that feature a recreated drawing from the 1910s, titled Maxime, of creatures roaming a forest. A deck from the Brooklyn-based design studio Fredericks & Mae offers a spectrum of colors so wide that no two cards are the same shade — in every game, players’ hands will take on a new color combination. Alternatively, Areaware’s deck, titled Minim Cards and complete with ultra-minimal versions of a deck’s typical characters, explores how much design can be stripped back while still maintaining meaning. In two different linen-embossed decks from the MoMA Design Store, the artist Kehinde Wiley’s works “Dacia Carter II” (2012) and “Yachinboaz Ben Yisrael II” (2021) illustrate the backs of the cards. Georg Jensen’s engravable Sky card holder, crafted from mirror-polished stainless steel and complete with a leather fastening, is the perfect companion gift to house whichever deck is best suited to your host’s taste.
