145 Carefully Selected, Unusually Special Gifts Under $50

The Strategist Holiday Gift Guide

This handsaw pouch from Puebco Online Market is the perfect size for an ID and some cash.

There’s a matching onesie for those who want to commit to the bit.

Designed by master toy-maker Yoshiyuki Nakamura, it looks like a kendama but spins like a top.

Finally translated into English, it follows a young onion on a quest to free his father and defeat the evil Prince Lemon.

A tart and unexpected take that pairs well with fish and eggs.

It’s expandable, comes in several colors, and is produced by the family-owned cutlery company Roger Orfèvre. (simplygourmand.com)

Powerful suction on its underbelly lets this bug climb walls and walk on the ceiling.

Made in Missoula, Montana, with Polartec 200 fleece on the outside and Power Grid fleece on the inside.

It opens onto a painted Mouse Mansion scene. The mailbox can receive tiny letters.

A twist on Willie Nelson’s red bandanna with an illustration of his guitar, Trigger.

A wicker-inspired collaboration between Crow Canyon Home and Domino magazine.

From a shade-inclusive, South Asia–inspired beauty brand.

The last time Film Forum released a hat was in 1991.

This puzzle rewards your 3-year-old’s hard work by becoming a functional cargo truck.

This kit includes all the materials and instructions needed to crochet your own stuffie.

Clean UV protection made from non-nano zinc oxide and sea buckthorn.

A jaunty way to cover a hole in a puffer jacket, sleeping bag, or pack.

An oversize striped bit of flair that fastens with a barrette.

Follows two little kids as they come to New York to see their first Broadway show.

An extra-long-lasting, non-creasing eye shadow from the maker of TikTok’s favorite peel-off lip-liner stain.

Cut from real U.S. currency, it’s best assembled with tweezers.

Adds a Wonka-esque touch to a dinner party; designed by Alessandra Baldereschi for Ichendorf Milano.

In honor of her big Whitney show, it depicts her 2020 painting A Midsummer Afternoon Dream.

Each color has its own scent, including night-blooming jasmine, amber, and garden rose.

These candles come in the shape of green fa, gold fa, red zhong, and green zhong tiles and smell like English pear and freesia.

With an embroidered illustration of one of the lion sculptures that guard the New York Public Library’s main steps.

Little Beast’s cozy striped turtleneck, available in sizes XXS to XXL.

From a store on the Lower East Side that specializes in tastefully embroidered caps.

Crafted from one bent steel wire, it’s simpler to use than it looks.

A compendium of 1930s comic strips about social-climbing suburbanites from The New Yorker’s first art editor.

This pocketable eight-inch umbrella came out in October and is the brand’s tiniest yet.

Fabric-freshening spray to help them cut down on dry-cleaning trips.

Can be used to seal and cinch but when upright makes an elegant photo holder. So popular it sold out last winter.

A pair of two-inch-tall stone fruits cast in pure beeswax.

The built-in whoopee cushion self-inflates.

A Paralía collab featured on Christian Cowan’s spring-summer 2026 runway.

A serving utensil with a cat-tail-inspired handle, designed for left-handed cooks.

It only looks like a classic No. 2. The orange color is new.

A vanilla-scented vitamin-C serum from Cyklar, founded by YouTuber and actress Claudia Sulewski.

The design of this oak-handled steel scraper is modeled on Japanese knives.

Featuring tumbling puffer fish.

Made with strawberries discarded from the Mattituck Lions Club Strawberry Festival.

Sustainable kelp pasta developed by a food scientist and an engineer.

Comes flat-packed (but is easy to put together); inspired by Dutch masters.

Designed by Parsons & Charlesworth, these patches envision what areas of the city would look like as nature reserves, such as the Midtown Cloud Forest.

Featuring Moomintroll and friends strolling through a field of daisies, designed for the Finnish character’s 80th birthday.

Made with Kakadu plum; from towel brand Baina’s body-care line.

In honor of Henry Clay Frick, who was an avid golfer.

From artist John Martin, who has been working with the Oakland-based studio for artists with developmental disabilities for nearly 40 years.

Hand-painted terra-cotta for displaying your soft-boiled eggs.

This truck comes with a detachable trash can and rubberized wheels so your toddler can pretend it’s alternate-side-parking day.

Every Monday Mabel, a tale of a trash enthusiast.

Creamy, buttery Wisconsin cheddar streaked with flinty bleu-cheese-like cultures from Roelli Cheese Haus.

All proceeds from each jar go to Rethink Food, a nonprofit that fights food insecurity.

Brushtail-possum-fur fibers blended with merino wool and nylon make for warm yet lightweight socks.

This racquet grip from New York tennis brand Bageled comes in three “flavors”: lox, cream cheese, and egg.

Caramelized for over 24 hours in an oven, 18 impossibly sweet Calabrian figs are bundled into a ball wrapped in leaves and twine.

This furry friend rolls around in its own hamster ball and can sense when it’s near doors and walls.

Almost too pretty to eat.

A collaboration between Cocolab and Oishii’s designer strawberries.

Smoky, hard-to-find Mexican trufflelike fungus, sold by the pound.

Seasoned with mozzarella cheese, tomato, and garlic.

Made from Mamellada-Lampiña free-range pigs.

Crafted from maple veneer with 3M adhesive backing, they’re meant to be placed on injured wooden surfaces, like a dinged dining-room table.

A swishy pair that’s on campuses everywhere, apparently.

Made from Surri olive trees, many of which are centuries old.

In quick-drying seersucker gingham.

Also known as a tarehake. Crafted with horsehair to deliver precise strokes.

A sachet of sodium, magnesium, and potassium.

Spraying cold water makes the car’s dirt disappear; warm water causes it to reappear.

Jo Zasloff introduces kids to the wonders of her profession.

A board game to play with up to five friends featuring iconic Sims characters.

Wickelfisch keeps the clothes of river commuters dry as a bone.

Creepy tattoos from the Edward Gorey House, the Cape Cod museum devoted to the illustrator.

[Editor’s note: These exact tattoos are sold out, but other Edward Gorey tattoos are available at Tattly.]

Shred your parmigiana directly into a drawer.

[Editor’s note: This grater is currently sold out. We’ll update this guide if it comes back in stock.]

Sidney is a microwavable weighted stuffie whose arms are meant to wrap around and comfort.

Like a bit of jewelry for your kitchen sink from a somewhat random Amazon seller we stumbled upon, Nawgnail.

The beloved blue tiger from KPop Demon Hunters gets the Funko Pop! treatment.

An opalescent eye shadow that’s been selling fast at Sukoshi uptown.

Collect your wheat and sheep on the go.

Made of blue borosilicate glass with a chrome finish; doubles as an incense holder.

Thin yet abrasion-resistant socks made of repurposed-nylon fabric.

Cork-backed with Lil’ Kim and Aaliyah from the 1997 music video.

Heavy cotton-linen-blend napkins with a bold tiger stripe.

Nearly 80,000 middle-schoolers and parents lined up for the launch of Salish Matter’s line.

[Editor’s note: This mist is currently sold out, but you can sign up for restock notifications on Sephora’s site.]

Word on the street is that they’re already selling out at the city’s shoppy shops.

From artist and Cookies Hoops podcast co-host Andrew Kuo.

Squirt NoNormal’s beet-sweetened bean paste into a mug of hot water and stir.

A papier-mâché wall mount about the size of a grapefruit.

[Editor’s note: This squirrel wall mount is sold out, but you can still get other animal mounts, like this hedgehog.]

From a limited-edition line of sweets-themed Rollbahns from Japanese stationery giant Delfonics.

A magnet on the carrot keeps this pair handy.

Inspired by 17th-century magic books; will wow kids à la Press Here.

Dennis Severs was an eccentric who transformed his London house into a period home belonging to a fictional Huguenot silk-weaving family. Each window reveals a scene.

Each set comes with a Barbie doll as well as everything they’ll need — ruffle-maker included — to craft her outfits.

It also comes in neon green.

Made of silk velvet.

New nail-care brand Celisse already has a cool-girl following.

The design of the official ball of the 2026 World Cup combines the three host nations: Canada, the U.S., and Mexico.

Made in Japan from vulcanized rubber and a classic for decades.

Made with Chilean berry and paramela, an ancient plant from the Strait of Magellan.

The main ingredient is mushrooms, and it has an earthy alpine scent.

A collection of three pecan-based snacks roasted with puffed fava beans, pepitas, and black sesame.

Whether they’re Team Conrad or Team Jeremiah.

A delightful compendium of bunny facts.

Tate McRae’s “Sports Car” is on one side of this four-inch record.

Hushidar Mortezaie’s design depicts flora from Palestine and Lebanon.

By Strategist writer Tembe Denton-Hurst, this book on nail art profiles top techs from New York to Berlin.

Actor Martin Starr and two of his candy-obsessed buds created these Swedish-and Japanese-inspired gummies. Ellen Van Dusen designed the packaging.

The Playmobil set comes with mother, baby, nurse, changing table, scale, bottles, and bottle warmer.

In a good way. Lichen’s incense is made with scent studio Fragile Glass for their new joint store, FF&E.

Nutscene’s spool is soft on garden stems but strong enough to secure a support stake. Available in lilac, lime, and deep orchid, among other colors.

For a very British Christmas dinner. Pairs well with a roast goose.

Ohuhu’s acrylic markers have something of a cult following among the adult coloring community.

A mirrored version of the suction accessory on every teen’s iPhone.

A miniature J.Crew Rollneck for their bag.

From Plain Goods, a New Preston–based purveyor of refined taste.

These sturdy stainless-steel slicers will be hard to misplace.

A dumpling-and-chopsticks earring from Studs’ collaboration with Din Tai Fung.

The greatest moments in basketball history through an emotional, rather than statistical, lens.

Given that script could be on the verge of extinction.

For the first time in 15 years, Topps has released NBA-licensed trading cards.

The viral plushie’s unibrowed cousin, the Wakuku, comes in a mystery box.

Yun Hai’s delicate leaves unfurl with notes of crisp fruit and wildflowers.

The wallet every 17-year-old keeps their new driver’s license in.

Sold at Wilson’s new Low Cinema in Ridgewood, it’s meant for getting popcorn out of your teeth.

Keep the room open with the full weight of Saturn.

For attaching pens and pencils to books.

Get their initials embroidered on Schweitzer linen.

Made for bikers by U.K.-based outdoors brand Elliker.

The Mercedes-Benz of power tools makes a kid-size toy drill — mercifully with “silent mode.”

Japan’s influential men’s-style magazine’s first English edition.

Interactive flip pages show Asawa’s wide range of artwork.

Blind-box snakes handmade by artist Kim Sandara.

Produced in the fall from southwestern-Wisconsin cows that at that point are eating a mix of summer grass and dry hay.

A two-by-three-inch calendar with day and month names in Italian.

Handmade from brass in Portugal.

A poster created by two Black educators, June Sark Heinrich and Bernadette H. Triplett, in 1970 in Chicago for the Society for Visual Education.

Blackwing pencils inspired by the bolts on the artist’s Tripes sculpture.

Each elf by Tennessee artist Mike Shults has a unique smile.

Made from beeswax by the Korean brand Odujej.

Open and manage a quaint used bookstore in “Bookstonbury-by-the-Sea” with this cozy Nintendo game.

To pair with Havaianas or Vibram FiveFingers.

The singer’s latest memoir chronicles her marriage.

[Editor’s note: Signed copies are sold out, but you can still order unsigned copies here.]

To keep tapers from tipping.