15 Brides Share What Makes The Perfect Wedding Gift

What makes the perfect wedding gift?

In researching this blog, I was shocked to find similar questions on the internet:

What makes a good wedding gift?

What are some good wedding gift ideas?

How can I plan the perfect wedding gift? 

These questions yield pages upon pages of the same boring articles. And on each page were the same boring ideas, one after the other.

"Get them Porcelain! Fancy Porcelain!"

or

"They just want a Hoover!"

Well, many thanks, June, I'll bear that in mind. 👍

Beyond that, I thought all of these ideas were okay. Not great, but okay. 

I had backed myself, surely I could do better? Armed with this thinking, I could have tried to hack at an answer, my way. 

I could have half collated some ramblings and thoughts about meaningful gifting and what a wedding ACTUALLY means. But how valuable would that be? 

So I went about it another way, and here is my conclusion: To find out what makes the perfect wedding gift, you must go straight to the source. 

It's at this moment I turned to my faithful ally Reddit. On Reddit, there are thousands of happily married people willing to share which gifts stood the test of time for them.

Reddit is: The ultimate resource. 

So here is a collection of 15 of the best findings. Let the lists be the lists, and the truth be the truth.  If anybody knows of any legal reason why these two people should suffer bland wedding gifts, let them speak now or forever hold their peace! 

What makes the perfect wedding gift? (According to Brides!)

Money & Gift Cards

~ We got mostly money and gift cards for our wedding, it was really nice because we were just starting out and had little money at the time.

The gift that we still giggle over years later is a box of pots and pans (extremely needed) with an ice cube tray in the bottom. It was a penis ice cube tray, it’s just something that we look back on and laugh about now.

Now we gift personalised lazy Susan’s, customised insulated cups, and gift cards. It just depends on the couple as to which one they get.

~ I got one gift. A card and 50 dollars from my favourite co-worker at the time. (Seriously wish I could adopt her as a grandma.) Anyway, We used the money to pay for our marriage certificate fee. I told her about it and she was so happy to be part of it in some way.

Something Sentimental

~ My dad has never been overly affectionate and has always been a bit closed off emotionally. I was shocked at how sentimental and emotional he got around my wedding. A few days before, he took me out to eat and gave me a necklace he had picked out himself. I cherish that a lot because it reminds me how much he cares!

We also really love the gift we got from my husband's aunt. She was stationed in Germany at the time and she got us this wooden plaque with a castle on it that says 'willkommen' and has our last name on it, it's beautiful.

~ His grandma made us a wedding ring quilt that we cherish. She hand embroidered around the rings, even though she was well above 80.#

~ There are two gifts that we really cherish. One is a framed Scottish wedding poem, the other is a pair of Mr / Mrs coffee mugs.

~ 11 years and there’s still only a handful around. Every time I see something broken, unusable or replaced, I always have the passing thought of “our marriage lasted longer than this [gift]”

~ The most cherished wedding gift I got was actually from my husband. The night before we got married, he gave me a beautiful pair of gold heart earrings. He said, as he was putting them on me, “these are to remind you, each time you look in the mirror, you’ll always have and be my heart.” At about year 18, one accidentally fell out, while I was showering, and went down the drain. I was crying frantically trying to retrieve it, but sadly it was lost. He knew how much I adored them. The next day, as I walked to my car after work, I noticed balloons inside. I opened the door to find the most beautiful heart earrings and a note he wrote telling me “you will forever have my heart.” 🥰🥰🥰 He’s the best gift I’ve ever gotten!!!

~ My childhood best friend (who is the one that introduced us 9 years prior to our wedding) made us a mixed-media painting that had mementos and pictures from our many years together and places we had been. It was both beautiful and thoughtful. It really was a celebration of us and was something that she put a lot of herself into so it was just a really special gift...

The other two things weren't really wedding gifts but the same friend also made my necklace and earrings for the ceremony which tied for second with a beautiful beaded shawl made by a very talented friend...

Something Practical

~ I don't know about cherished but we got a nice high quality dish set (probably $100/4 piece setting) and we have used it every day for over 6 years

I honestly can't remember what else we got

~ My husband bought me an SUV for my wedding gift. Fully paid for. That means that I never worried about a car payment!!! We traded my car in and he paid off the rest. I was slightly worried about the monthly payment, because I was part time working with a year old toddler/baby (still breastfeeding, if you know, you know). I had to leave during the paperwork part after the test drive….. came back to pick up my husband like an hour or so later, and was told by the salesman, while waiting for my husband, it was paid for in full. I asked if he was sure. Yep, I cried, right there, ugly cry, all over the car as I hugged it.

Other great mentionable stuff:

Double pearl necklace my mom wore at her wedding (omg),

Kitchen-Aide blender,

Metal tray with Navy Pier engraved on it,

Books with our initials folded into the pages, and a separate book with our wedding date,

My veil, gifted from my grandmother, however she could not remember which of her six daughter or seven of her daughter in laws wore it, but it was well loved and well used, with not a rip or stain in site!

~ I’m not sentimental so I’ll go with the practical option. The one gift from 29 years ago that I still use fairly regularly is a Kitchen aid Mixer.

~ I asked my wife and she said, "You". ❤️

Pressed on it, beyond the china/Waterford/silver, we could think of only one thing that's survived all these 39 years and it's a Vintner wine opener (kind of like this but better) that's still used all the time. We also had a juicer that finally crapped-out two months ago.

Unique wedding gifts 

~ This is probably a little silly, but me and my husband were saving for a house. Tight budget, small apartment, so for the wedding we only asked for money as even if people got us really nice things we didn't have room to store it. Everyone complied with this request except some really good friends of ours. (who when we finally did buy our house ended up buying one in the same neighbourhood that same week and are now also our neighbours 💕) They knew we'd wanted a Nintendo Switch for years, ever since it came out. They also knew that we had not bought it because we were saving literally every penny and it was a want and not a need.

You probably know what's coming, but when we opened that box to see that switch we were both giddy. They even included a note on it that had a friendly reminder that it's okay to treat yourself and have a little fun once and a while. That switch +animal crossing is basically what got me through the early part of COVID-19 while pregnant with our second. I still treasure it and the fact that they just wanted us to have a little fun. 🤗💕

~ The fact that I didn’t get any gifts so I didn’t have to write out thank you notes!! 😅

Conclusion

So what’s the conclusion of all this? If you’re an organiser; purchasing a wedding gift for someone close to you, your best bet would be on buying something sentimental, practical or if you’re really in doubt, just give them the money! 

Then that brings us onto the next big question. How do I collect money for a wedding gift? 

Thankfully, Collctiv has a simple three step process to do just that:

1. Create a pot 
2. Share a payment link
3. Watch the money roll in

Making it simple to collect money from groups; and ensuring a wedding gift they will cherish! 

Organisers bring people together

Since 2019 - Collctiv has helped over 200,000 people from 83 countries come together by making it simple for Organisers to collect money from groups. Whether it's group gifts, retirement presents or sports teams - download our free app today and start bringing people together!