What gift to get for the writer in your life? We’d like things that both support our writing habits and are awesome please. This is good because it means that if you’re on a tight budget you can give someone a homemade voucher for writing time and it will be a brilliant gift. Turn off your internet for the day, make them a cup of tea and pack them off to the study for a few hours. Ideally you’ll make them a little packed lunch and take care of all the chores while they write, but as a minimum make sure the house is quiet and they don’t get disturbed.

If you’ve got some money to spend though, try these ideas. This week it’s all about useful stuff that’s covetable, and look out next week for a tech and equipment edition.

 

Writing Maps

A series of cute illustrated maps, each with at least 12 creative writing exercises that guide you to explore the city, your home, characters, the writing process and life in general.

 

Writing socks/slippers

This is something that baffles non-writers; most people wear shoes to work, after all. Just think though, how awesome would it be if you could wear slippers to work? Well we can. Ha! And even the kind of writer who manages to get dressed in real clothes before work every day (really? They exist?) is likely to get cold extremities.

I love these owl slipper socks from Marks & Spencer. They also have reindeer, polar bear, fair isle and snowflake versions, or plain grey cable knit if you insist upon being sensible. I’ll be very happy in my polar bear socks come Boxing Day.

If you really want to go all-out though, try microwaveable slippers. Yes, really. Toasty toes, mmm.

 

Also available in Bagpuss flavour. Embarrassing? Maybe. But who doesn’t love Bagpuss?

 

Blankets

While we’re on the subject of being cold… Curling up in a chair reading, working without the heating on, finding a spot outside to work, all of these make blankets great gifts for writers.

This gorgeous grey lambswool number is from John Lewis. It’s lovely and soft, and comes a range of colours including duck-egg blue, cream and scarlet.

 

The Edinburgh Woollen Mill makes tartan blankets in a number of colours. Checked blankets are everywhere at the moment, and this traditional one is on sale from £40 to £20 at the moment – a bargain for the quality.

The cheapest of the bunch at £12 each, these blankets from the National Trust vary in colour and are made from recycled wool so you can be, erm, smug as a bug in a rug. Sorry. Couldn’t resist.

 

Notebooks

There is no such thing as too many notebooks, only notebooks too ugly or impractical to want to use or the wrong size. I like A4 to write in and use A5 for ideas, always lined, but many writers like mini pocket-sized books for capturing ideas on the go and unlined for ideas.

I’m having a fox moment. This, from thelemonpony on Etsy, is brilliant because it’s actually a mini moleskine notebook with a removable cover that can be used again and again.

A Mark Twain quote on this notebook is a reminder of why your writer needs to write. Like, now, not when the time is right and inspiration strikes and the moon is perfectly aligned with Jupiter.

Moleskines are the daddy of notebooks. They’re relatively expensive though, so on the grounds that it’s good to treat people to gifts they wouldn’t splash out on for themselves they’re an excellent present idea.

Rachel Bright has some great notebooks. This is my current favourite.

 

Other Cool Stuff

These all come from the rather brilliant Literary Gift Company.

A wooden box of tricks to guide you around creative obstacles.

Tea/coffee (and therefore mugs) are very important to writers. This one is ace.

I wanted to post the cushion of this but it looks like they’ve run out. A tote bag is way more useful though, and I’m supposed to be being useful…

 

Square Mile, one of London’s best coffee roasters do gift subscriptions for monthly coffee deliveries.

What? Chocolate totally counts as useful.

 
 

Disclaimer: Some of the links above are affiliate links. It doesn’t affect the price you pay, and I include things because I like them regardless of whether there is any benefit to me, but if you buy through some of those links a small portion of what you pay will go towards supporting my work here at UWR. Thanks! If you’re not happy about that, feel free to google the items instead….