Happy holidays, everyone! It’s that time of year when we start ticking items off our gift lists. When considering gifts for friends and family, inspiration often takes me into the world of beauty products. Unfortunately, some people are still apprehensive about gifting skincare. They worry that it might be perceived as a subtle dig or send a message that the recipient has less-than-stellar skin. I’d never want a gift to cause offense, and let me assure you that there is a world of difference between giving a thoughtful and beautifully packaged skincare gift and giving a tube of acne treatment or wrinkle cream. No one could possibly take offense to these chic, fool-proof selections:
Bath Products or Personal Fragrance
A luxurious bath oil or milled soap has wide appeal and can fit into any self-care routine. My personal pick would be something like a set of soaps from Ortigia. I fell in love with the brand and their variety of body care, soaps, and bath products while in Italy last year. Their beautiful Lime di Sicilia fragrance immediately transports me back to the Mediterranean.
For a more personal gift, a cologne or eau de parfum can be a fantastic choice. Smell is the sense most closely tied to memory, and there’s something so familiar and intimate in receiving a gift that someone chose because it reminded them of you. Fragrance that you wear so close to your body is highly individual and selecting one shows that you know a person well. I love I Don’t Know What by D.S. & Durga because it’s designed to layer with other fragrances but also wears beautifully on its own.
Home Fragrance
A candle or scented diffuser is another great way to give the gift of amazing aromas. I particularly love candles around this time of year because nothing contrasts the cold, gray weather like the warmth and glow of an open flame. Both Ortigia and D.S. & Durga offer a great selection of candles, as well.
Choreograph a Skincare Routine
Put together a little routine for the skincare-obsessed friend in your life. Include products they love along with some brands they may not have tried before, and focus on products that work well together. So many items from my collection pair beautifully with May Lindstrom’s line, and we made a video to demo how well they work together. My Hydrate Facial Serum in particular is an excellent choice for mixing and matching. It offers pure hydration with no oils, silicones, or strong actives that would interfere with other products’ ingredients, meaning that it will work for anyone and pair with anything.
Gift Cards
Take some of the pressure off yourself and allow the gift recipient to choose something they love. You can also do several smaller gift cards across multiple brands (including mine) so they can build a skincare routine out of their favorite products.
Mix and Match
Mix and match from a few categories to create a custom self-care package—for example, a great bottle of wine, a high-quality olive oil, and a beautifully fragranced bath product would have me over the moon. This option provides a lot of flexibility that you can tailor to the recipient, so have fun with it!
XO,
Jordan
