Gift Boxes as Presents

Presents in boxes

Gift boxes add another dimension to giving presents to friends or family. To present a gift to someone in a beautiful hand-made gift box greatly enhances the pleasure of the receiver, as the boxes become another part of the gift and can be used later as keepsake boxes or jewelry boxes.

Boxing of gifts

High fashion and high street stores have always presented items in gift boxes and many old movies show ladies strolling along the sidewalk carrying large hat boxes tied with fancy ribbons. Nowadays numerous large stores have cottoned on to the fact, that people like their gifts in beautifully wrapped boxes, and have therefore started to offer this wrapping service to consumers.

Making a gift box

The simplest type of box can be made from paper using the Japanese method of paper folding, origami. The paper does not have to be expensive, ordinary A4 Xerox paper can be used and after the construction can be decorated with paints, pencils, coloured markers, beads or sequins. These are great as a candy box for lollies or peanut brittle or filled with decorated cookies or fresh home-grown strawberries from your yard. There are many beautiful craft books for sale in the stores that give clear illustrated instructions on many origami projects. Gift boxes do not have to cost a fortune and can be made from all kinds of things that many people would have in their homes.

Painted boxes

Paint is a very cheap alternative decorative medium and with a little preparation your gift box can become a thing of beauty. Select a style of painting that complements the shape of your box or will suit the person for whom it is intended. Barge painting is popular with its bright colours and simple subject matter. Scandinavian imagery is pretty with pale colours and subtle styles, relying on natural subject matter and pattern for its effect. Arabic patterns and colours lend themselves to being painted on boxes and if highlighted with gold leaf or bright gold paint they can look amazing. Line your box with sumptuous fabrics in luxurious colours. Whatever decoration method you choose finish all your gift boxes with a couple of coats of clear lacquer for a very professional look that will last.

Utilize cheap boxes for presents

Gift wrapping

There are often boxes lying around which would have contained shoes, cheese, cereal, chocolates or cookies to name but a few. All these light card boxes can be utilised to create wonderful gift boxes for your birthday surprise. They can be covered with pretty print fabrics and decorated with ribbons and beads, or machine embroidered. Light card boxes can be used as a base for paper mache projects; these are covered with several thin layers of paper soaked in paste and left to dry thoroughly before painting and varnishing. Paper mache used to be popular in Japan where it originated and many items including furniture were made in this medium.

Wooden gift box

Wood boxes can also be recycled to be used as exciting and decorative gift boxes they can be picked up for a few cents in garage sales and second hand stores and completely refurbished to create a unique box that will make a wonderful present for anyone. When you get your box home, clean it well, inside and out and let it dry thoroughly before starting the decorating process. You may embellish your box with many different materials. Decoupage is the art of cutting out pre printed images either from magazines or from sheets of images made for this purpose. The pictures are then stuck onto the exterior surface of the box in a pleasing composition and finally covered with several coats of clear lacquer. Mosaic tiles are another option that you can use to cover the surface of your wooden box these are particularly useful if the box looks a bit worn or tattered as they cover everything.