My (Super) Edited MoMA Design Store Gift Guide

It's the ultimate emporium of cool-people-design gifts, where going absolutely nuts would be understandable. I picked 17 favorites + the six I (actually) bought, too.

IDK about you, but I can still remember a handful of times someone has given me a gift that really left an impression. On my 38th birthday, my friend Hadis gave me two obscure vintage fashion books and a giant ivory-colored cocktail ring, a piece that seemed to already know the person I was becoming. Just a few years ago, my friend Laura gave me a Balmuda toaster oven when she learned our fixer-upper upstate didn’t have a kitchen. And, I swear…I’ve never used and loved an appliance so much.

We all know what that feels like…to give or receive something that feels so prescient and perfect…so useful, even if that primary job is to simply conjure pure unadulterated delight. So, this season, I’m putting all my attention on real gifts…the ones that make us feel something. Not anxiety gifts bought under duress or panic presents bought out of insecurity—only gifts I can attest are sincerely GREAT and worth it for people I like and love, people (like myself) who truly do not need one more piece of pointless stuff in their lives…🎯

Which is why today’s guide is exclusively dedicated to the MoMA Design store, a venerable temple of modern art, ground-breaking thinkers, and vibrant objects and keepsakes intended to bend our minds and enhance our lives in innumerable ways. TBH, there isn’t (really) a museum store anywhere that I won’t buy a cool notebook, but the other reason I’m focusing here is that shopping MoMA makes us smarter and more aware—and in awe!—of the histories and backgrounds of both iconic products and the artists/people/periods behind them (MoMA includes a handy “Why We Chose It” section, which feels a little bit like an actual trip to the museum:). And, as with most global museums, becoming a member extends a discount to all the amazing stuff in their design store, so consider that a very awesome gift, too (on top of all the BFCM discounts, oc).

So, that’s what we’ve got here…a punch list of 17 unique, iconic, truly collectible things, most of them (hallelujah!) under $100, too. Special things I have a very good feeling will make the people in your life feel special, too. xxCb