Last-Minute Style Gift Guide

Presents for everyone on your list: from nieces to nemeses

Buying gifts for everyone on your list isn't easy. Between your grandmother who collects string and your neighbor that may be plotting your murder, you have a lot of weirdos to buy for this year. We are here to help with our last-minute style gift guide. Here are some suggestions for the toughest people on your list.

For the Minimalist Who Wants Nothing

photo source: BDJ Craftworks/ FB

BDJ Craftworks Wooden Vases (various prices)

Your very particular uncle once considered adding a vase to his loft upon seeing a white tulip with a perfect 45 degree curve. But that would have meant giving up counter space (he keeps reminding you he paid a lot for all that marble). But had he had known about Brian David Johnson’s hardwood vases, inlaid with ribbons of resin, he might have changed his mind. Each wall mounted vase is handmade from sustainably harvested woods and are sleek enough to please the pickiest decorator. Imagine all the fun he will have picking a place to hang it.

Take Heart
1111 E 11th St. #100, 512/520-9664
Tue.-Sat., 11am-6pm, Sun., 11am-5pm
www.takeheartshop.com

For the Witch Who Has Everything

photo by Mari Hernandez
Ax+Apple Snake Necklace ($128)

Your best frenemy has enough black lace scarves to clothe a Stevie Nicks army. Her collection of candles would provide more than enough light for a citywide blackout. And when she wants a new look, she just casts a glamour. But even she would swoon over this serpent from Ax+Apple, a Los Angeles jewelry maker with Austin roots. Throw in a tarot deck from the Wild Unknown ($40) and a sage smudge ($12) if she recently let you borrow a pair of her black pointy boots. Curse them if she cast a spell on your boyfriend.

Feathers Boutique
1700B S. Congress, 512/912-9779
Daily 11am-7pm
www.feathersboutiquevintage.com

For the Dapper Dan

photo by Jana Birchum

Vintage Pocket Watches (various prices)

The tie, the cufflinks, the tilt of the hat. Your man keeps every detail tight. He can’t just go around telling time from any old iPhone. No, he needs something he can whip from his pocket while balancing a single malt Scotch, something with the right amount of flash. Dandy’s has an affordable array of pocket watches that always look timely. But be warned, he probably won’t look at it until well past midnight.

Dandy’s
411 Brazos St #110, 512/999-8196
Tue.-Sat., noon-7pm, Sun., by appointment
www.dandysuit.com

For the Fashion-Forward Headbanger

photo by Mari Hernandez

Via Christa Skull Necklace ($260)

On her first day of camp, your favorite niece deleted all her Taylor Swift playlists and announced she was only going to listen to Gorgoroth. Now that she's in college, she has stopped mixing her Bonne Bell to make corpse paint, but that doesn't mean she has given up her edge. She would never stop screaming if you gave her Via Christa’s skull necklace. And that may just be the start of a musical career.

Feathers Boutique

A note to readers: Bold and uncensored, The Austin Chronicle has been Austin’s independent news source for over 40 years, expressing the community’s political and environmental concerns and supporting its active cultural scene. Now more than ever, we need your support to continue supplying Austin with independent, free press. If real news is important to you, please consider making a donation of $5, $10 or whatever you can afford, to help keep our journalism on stands.

Support the Chronicle  

READ MORE
More Gift Guide 2015
Gift Guide 2015: Fiction by Austin Authors
Gift Guide 2015: Fiction by Austin Authors
From Hill Country mysteries to Lone Star steampunk, fantasy femmes with swords to alienated runaways with lycanthropic tendencies, there's an Austin novel for everyone on your gift list

Robert Faires, Dec. 11, 2015

More by Brandon Watson
My Obsession: Therapy With Nineties Supermodels
My Obsession: Therapy With Nineties Supermodels
Escape via the long gay tradition of diva worship

Sept. 15, 2017

Review: Holy Roller
Review: Holy Roller
The personal is edible at Callie Speer’s new hot spot

Sept. 8, 2017

KEYWORDS FOR THIS POST

Gift Guide 2015

MORE IN THE ARCHIVES
One click gets you all the newsletters listed below

Breaking news, arts coverage, and daily events

Keep up with happenings around town

Kevin Curtin's bimonthly cannabis musings

Austin's queerest news and events

Eric Goodman's Austin FC column, other soccer news

Information is power. Support the free press, so we can support Austin.   Support the Chronicle