Hostess Gifts

How to Choose Hostess Gifts That Don't Create Work

A good hostess gift is the one the host can accept with one hand while holding a dish with the other. That narrows the field quickly, and it is how we sort everything below.

Bring something that works on its own

Flowers need a vase and a decision. A bottle needs a corkscrew and a mood. A hostess gift that works on its own, like a bar of Mistral soap, a box of HomArt matches or a jar of In the Curious Kitchen's Strawberry Jalapeño Jam, can go straight into a drawer or onto a counter. Mistral's soap comes in four scents, Black Amber, Bourbon Vanilla, Cedarwood Marine and Salted Gin.

Present it like you meant it

The correction we make most often is that people spend on the gift and then hand it over loose. Hostess gifts read better in a bag, and a bag also means the host can carry it to the kitchen without unwrapping anything. Three things rarely go wrong: soap, a candle with matches, or something edible with a lid. All three can sit on a counter until the party ends, and none of them asks the host for anything. Cheers Darling's art deco wine gift bag from The Twentieth is $6 and turns a bottle into a gift, and we send everything out in High St. tissue and a bag with cord handles anyway. If you'd like to wrap something at home, we sell select wrapping paper.

Hostess Gift Ideas by Type and Occasion

Dinner party hostess gifts, holiday host gifts and thank-you gifts all follow the same logic. Here is how we split them.

Candles, matches and soap

Lineage's candles come in a range of scents including Boot Jack, Pine Camp, Wildwood and Palo Santo, and its room sprays share names like Boot Jack, Pine Camp and Wildwood, so one scent can come as a candle for the host and a spray for the guest bathroom. Tatine and Mistral fill the slot above them for a host you want to impress a little. Add HomArt matches, which come in illustrated designs from rare snakes to butterfly specimens, and the candle is ready to light. Scent is personal, so if you don't know the host well, Palo Santo or Wildwood is safer than something sweet.

Glasses, bar pieces and a bar cart touch

Zodax's Bandol glassware comes in six shapes, so a pair of coupes or two everything glasses can go into one bag for a host who pours. For a host with a bar cart, Viski's gold weighted barspoon and Barfly's muddler are small pieces that get used every weekend. Barware has the rest of the bar cart.

Pantry gifts and small treats

In the Curious Kitchen's Strawberry Jalapeño Jam is the gift for a host with a cheese board. Kalastyle Soap Co.'s Wood Aromatics Cedar Wood Hand Salve is the gift for the host who just spent four hours in the kitchen. These are small on purpose. The point of hostess gifts is gratitude, not an inventory. If the host has a pantry full of jars already, soap is the safer yes, because there is always another sink.

Closing gifts and moving-in thank-yous

Closing gifts and relocation thank-yous follow the same rule, only the host is a realtor or a neighbor. A set of Cincinnati Map Slate Coasters from Blue Ridge Mountain Gifts is a local, useful gift for someone who helped you find the house, and a candle from Candles + Scents covers everyone else. For a new home, the housewarming gift guide lists what we would bring.

Hostess Gifts in Cincinnati

We are a lifestyle store in Over-the-Rhine, 17,000 square feet at 1401 Reading Rd, Cincinnati, OH 45202. Hostess gifts are easier to choose with the object in your hand, so come by the floor. Open every day but Tuesday: 10am to 6pm, Sunday 11am to 4pm. CityBeat named us Best Interior Designer in 2024, and the Design Studio team, who spend their days helping people furnish whole rooms, will gladly help with a host gift. Rosemary's is inside High St., on the second floor, and keeps the same hours. For a lower number, the gifts under $50 page sorts by price.

Pickup, shipping and presentation

Free shipping on orders over $150; domestic standard shipping is otherwise $15. In-stock online orders are usually ready for pickup in about two hours. We don't offer traditional gift wrap. Purchases go out in High St. branded tissue and premium bags with cord handles and a gold-foil logo.