(
)
It’s the most wonderful time of the year — until you see the look of horror on your significant other’s face when he or she receives your gift. Santa at least had a list.
The Post can’t recommend anything that your beloved will be 100 percent assured of loving: We don’t know your beloved. We can, however, like Rudolph, guide you away from some of the options most likely to land you on your beloved’s naughty list (and not in a sexy way).
First, it’s not always the thought that matters when it comes to handmade gifts. If you’re contemplating a craft present, you’d better be one of those “artisans” that local menus are always touting.
Jenna Sauers, a 27-year-old model turned journalist from Harlem, was gifted a serious DIY fashion faux pas.
“Once I got a dress that someone had made,” Sauers says. “He thought it would be a good idea to embellish the fabric by lighting it on fire. So the hem was all burned, part of the side of the dress was burned and the neckline — all burned. We’re talking singed fabric. Blackened and tattered. It looked like a walking ‘stop, drop and roll’ joke.
“He said it hadn’t come out quite the way he’d planned, to which I mentally replied, ‘How did you think a burned dress would come out?’ ”
Moral? Avoid craft projects unless you know what you’re doing.
Other wearable gifts, such as jewelry, pose their own set of problems, even when they do come out as expected. In “Breakfast at Tiffany’s,” Holly Golightly observed: “You could always tell what kind of a person a man thinks you are by the earrings he gives you.”
It’s still true. You must know your partner’s taste ridiculously well before you attempt this. And that’s not just true of women.
John Carney, a 39-year-old cable news editor from Park Slope, says his worst gift was a pair of shoes from the wrong side of the subculture.
“I was a hard core, punk rock kid who wore Doc Martens,” he says. “She gave me penny loafers.”
And don’t even think about gifting lingerie. A recent study conducted by UK lingerie retailer Fox & Rose found that 1 in 5 women never wear the lacy underthings their husbands give them.
Claire Chambers, the CEO of Manhattan-based lingerie store Journelle, says that many women return items after the holidays, commenting: “I don’t know what he was thinking.” In lieu of a lace teddy, she recommends a cashmere robe or a pair of silk pajamas, which are almost universally appreciated. (Just don’t get creative and set them on fire.)
So it’s a risk to get too creative or too personal. What about going the other way, with a completely impersonal gift card?
You might as well get them a lump of coal.
“Giving someone a gift certificate is giving them an errand,” says Robbie Sokolowsky, 33, a creative director from TriBeCa. “It’s like giving them a DVD to return to Blockbuster — if those exist anymore.”
If you want to play it really, really, really safe? Just ask your S.O. for suggestions. Tell them all you want for Christmas is a list — and maybe a few minutes under the mistletoe.