What To Buy Your Postgrad For Christmas

It's been a long term. But somehow, finally it's over, and your pet postgrad has emerged blinking into the dim, watery December sunlight, shivering and mumbling, "What, it's Christmas? No it's not. What day is it?"

They are too busy and confused to write their own Christmas list, so here are some suggestions of my own about what to buy them.

Paperblanks: because you need to feel important

A nice diary

A hardback one with an attractive cover, good quality paper, and lots of space per day for writing ESSAY DEADLINE!!! in pink highlighter and underlining it five times. Paperblanks and Moleskines are reliable favourites, and luxurious enough to make a really nice present. This diary will save your life (or degree, which at this point is essentially the same thing), because it will help you keep track of what day it is.

Collections of poetry and short stories

Because you don't have time to read whole novels any more, but maybe you can fit in a poem or two in between The Contest of Meaning: Critical Histories of Photography, Photographs Objects Histories: On The Materiality of Images and Photography, Anthropology and History. Sob sob. These are on my list:

Coffee syrups

Anything to make your seventh coffee of the day go down easier.

Grad school breakfast.

Literary prints posters

These will make you feel like an intellectual in front of all your smart new PhD friends, and inspire you when you think 5000 words is impossibly long and you'll be writing this essay forever. Take "Write drunk; edit sober" to heart as thesis advice; it can only help.

RELEVANT.

Non-rustling library snacks

After hour 5 in the library, you will need more energy because you are starving and on the edge of tears, but whipping out giant bags of Doritos and popcorn, while emotionally satisfying, will swiftly turn you into the most hated person in Oxford. Consider decanting some yummy, energy-releasing snacks into cute portion-sized jars and pots from which they can be surreptitiously eaten under the desk. I can recommend these peanuts and dried cranberries drizzled with dark chocolate by my very own hand (it looks impressive, elegant and Christmassy, and took all of five minutes) - also try other dried fruit like mango or pineapple, bite sized brownies (although avoid crumbly foods), jelly babies, and caramelised nuts. Drizzle it all with extra chocolate, because really, I've been in the library for five hours. Have mercy.

A graze box subscription would also work perfectly for this.


Cookbooks
Because if you're going to take stop working long enough to eat something that takes more than 0.5 minutes to prepare, it had better be worth it. Failing that, you can look at the pictures and dream of the day you will have enough free time and money to make any of it. Here are some I have my wistful eye on:

Is this not the most beautiful cookbook you have ever seen

Earrings

Because sometimes they let you out of the library and require you to interact with other humans, sometimes quite important ones at quite fancy occasions, and you need to impress them with your good taste in classic rich lady jewellery. I'm into gold knot earrings, and tiny ones with elegant, non-sparkly stones like these gold and garnet ones from Pia.

MAC lipsticks

Because feeling pretty sometimes is helpful in avoiding a total meltdown. I personally am hoping Crosswires (left) will give me a youthful glow, to help me blend in with all the 18 year old Brasenose freshers in the Radcliffe Camera.

A Spotify Premium subscription

Because nothing - NOTHING - ruins your essay writing flow faster and breaks your concentration more irretrievably than loud, inane adverts for Sourz shots, Ford dealerships, anti-wrinkle cream and Christmas compilation albums. Please just let me listen to the calming sounds of Yo Yo Ma playing Bach in peace, Spotify. Please.

Stuff with pugs on

It's the little things.

Urban Outfitters

Etsy

Etsy

Going At It: Lip Crayons

Trend alert! It looks like make up companies have finally cottoned on to the old trick of colouring your mouth in with lip pencil, because lip crayons have started popping up all over the place since last spring, and happily it's got to the stage where there are a bunch of budget versions coming out. Because I have been known to be a desperate trend bunny, I bought, uh... four. Let's try them!

1. Barry M Lip Lacquer Crayon No 6 Candyfloss, £4.99

2. Topshop Lip Stick in Powder Room, £7

3. Soap & Glory Sexy Motherpucker Gloss Stick in Nudist, £8

4. F&F Lip Crayon in Tickled Pink, £5

One Dress, Four Outfits

Top of my ermahgerd-I-want-this-so-badly list for summer is this pretty, pretty blue floral dress from Topshop (£60).  It’s basically my dream outfit. Buuut living life as an unemployed undergrad student whose next loan instalment doesn’t come until mid-September, I have to justify it to myself. And I’m doing that the way I always do: by telling myself I can wear this dress for everything. But you know what? This time it’s actually true. This is the perfect dress for wearing to lots of different occasions in different ways. That makes it a brilliant investment and therefore a totally justifiable purchase, right? Right? Exactly.

Let me show you how.

You will need:

1. A dress sort of like this dress. It should probably fall somewhere between mid-thigh and mid-calf, in a colour or cute print. A top and pretty skirt would also work.

2. Some places to wear it to. This is actually the hard part for me.

To a scary work meeting

Office, £60

Whistles, now £9

            You CAN wear adorable dresses and still look professional, you just have to accessorise them well, and probably also wear tights. Smart, understated earrings will draw attention to your competent, reassuring and beautiful face (yes, you have one of those). These silver and blue drops from Whistles will make you look tremendously grown up; matching tones (but not colours) between your outfit and jewellery is a fast way to seem put together (bonus: sale!).  Choose a blazer or suit jacket and a sensible but pretty mid-height heel like these from Office for a simple, stylish work look. Try either in a pinkish-nude or cream for a summery, slightly more casual look, or pick both in black to show you mean srs bsns.

To your cousin’s garden wedding

Nine West, £110

            This is a perfect summer wedding dress, because it sits neatly on the line between fancy and casual. To avoid heel sinking into grass issues, wear shoes with thicker heels. The cute yellow of this peeptoe pair will complement the blue dress (because I know you know your colour wheel) as well as holding up on damp grass. A set of pearl earrings, necklace and bracelet (real or fake) will say that you are classy and sophisticated. Take a cream or buttercup yellow cardigan or light jacket with you in case it gets cool. If you’re a nail painter, a contrasting shade like Lancome Vernis in Love Midnight Rose (a rich purple) or Rose Boudoir (a deep fuchsia) will add visual interest and keep the look young, while a fascinator or hat will make you look appropriately fancy. I love this one from Philip Treacy, and its colour picks up the secondary colour in the print perfectly, but I won’t even bother telling you how much it costs.

Oh, alright. It's £2,250 from Harrods. Perhaps you could make your own?

On a romantic picnic

Whimsy! ASOS, £20

Zara, £25.99

 A pretty floral dress is perfect for skipping merrily through a park in the sunshine, hand in hand with your best guy or gal. Go for a fun, whimsical look with a pair of eye-catching sunglasses and some studded flats like these Zara slippers. These brilliant, unique earrings from Asos will give you all the eccentric Manic Pixie Dream Girl charm you could wish for. Carry a holdall big enough for a blanket and a bottle of prosecco. Go light on make up; just wear enough mascara that you can bat your eyelashes at your lover effectively as you ask if you can have the last of the smoked salmon.

Bar crawl for your best friend's birthday

             Because the shape of this dress is pretty demure and the print is so light and pretty, you can sex it up infinitely and still look like a classy gal. A fitted little black leather (or leather-look) biker jacket will get you feeling like a Bad Grrrl and play off the good-girliness of the dress. Pick a bold contrasting shade like berry red for your accessories. Using only a few strong colours will keep your outfit looking clean and striking, not overdone. 

Topshop, £55

Mango, £59.99

           

Target, $29.99

ASOS, now £10.50

These Target heels have all the sexiness of red shoes, but the darker shade, curved heel shape and thin strap keep them sophisticated, not trashy. (Seriously, people of America, how do you not spend ALL your money in Target?) This Mango envelope clutch picks up the deep red;  if you hate carrying a bag in your hand and you’re crafty,


 you could MacGyver a strap from a long, sturdy necklace chain. Wear a dramatic cocktail ring and another pair of exciting jewelled Asos earrings, which pick up the colours of the outfit perfectly (on sale, too!). Finish with a vampy make up look of false eyelashes and an attention grabbing berry red lipstick like Too Faced Sex Kitten or Rimmel Diva Red, because you know, it’s not only ‘50s secretaries and housewives who get to match their lipstick to their accessories.