The Gifts We Never Expected to Be Buying This Year
This year’s Highsnobiety Gift Guide is all about the presents that’ll make a difference in these new and strange times. From gifts that encourage connection with loved ones, to self-love suggestions you entirely deserve at the end of 2020.
This year has been like no other. Most facets of life and culture have changed in immeasurable ways. In fashion, brands and retailers have had to adapt to completely new ways of life — quarantine, working from home, and the now ubiquitous face mask.
The face mask is now a (government-sanctioned) essential. And it joins many other products that have unexpectedly found themselves on the list of potential, and bizarre, holiday gifts for 2020. From the aforementioned face covering to hand sanitizer, via high-fashion PPE, we’ve compiled a list of gifts that we’d have never have expected to be buying to our loved ones this time last year.
As always — fashionable PPE isn’t always the safest, so we’d advise using the products below in conjunction with those recommended by health authorities.
Scroll for some pandemic holiday gift ideas.
Marine Serre Face Mask
Perhaps the product of 2020, the face mask made its transformation from unusual accessory to government-sanctioned essential this year. Luxury brands got on board quickly, and now everyone from Off-White™ to Marine Serre is making them.
Cactus Jack Hand Sanitizer
The hand sanitizer is another product that became a new essential during this abnormal annum. Even Travis Scott is now in the business of bottled hygiene.
SafeTouch Hygiene Tool
While still a relatively niche product of 2020, the SafeTouch hygiene multi-tool is one for those that take extra caution in Covid times. When hand sanitizer just won't cut it.
Takashi Murakami Jigsaw Puzzle
OK, a jigsaw puzzle might have been on your gift list for the older side of your family during previous holidays, this category has been blown wide open for everyone this year. Thanks, quarantine.
UNIQLO AIRism Face Masks
Not everyone can afford a Marine Serre face mask. And for something you're breathing hot air into all day, spending more than $15 for one could be considered excessive. For under that price, you can get three of UNIQLO's queue-generating AIRism face masks.
MoMA Two-in-One Chess & Checkers Set
Like the puzzle above, more time indoors put chess on the agenda. Oh, and a show you might have heard of called The Queen's Gambit.
Grown Alchemist Hand Cream
Not the first, nor the last of our hand-centric products on this list. 2020 has been tough on those paws of yours, and it doesn't look like they're getting a break anytime soon. Take care of them with good hand cream.
Brain Dead Shroom Cola Soap
This soap by Brain Dead, one of the brands of 2020, finishes off a three-point approach to fortress-like hand protection. The Dead Shroom scent also smells surprisingly amazing.
MYKITA Guard One Visor
Luxury PPE is another new category of the wardrobe we definitely didn't see coming. And in this arena, MYKITA laid claim to one of the 2020's best.
Stone Island Gloves
Elsewhere on the PPE front, gloves are no longer just a winter-cheating accessory.
Our designated Selects section features products that we love and want to share with you. Highsnobiety has affiliate marketing partnerships, which means we may receive a commission from your purchase.
