Collection: Birthday Gifts

We love a birthday in the Tinker and Fix household. Scarily, we’ve known each other through a lot of ‘significant’ birthdays (including 18^th, 21^st and now 40^th and 45^th – gulp). We know that it’s hard to find the perfect gifts for people who like to make, mend, and garden - and it's even harder when you’ve been together a bloomin long time, so you’ve exhausted a lot of good gift options over the years!

The ‘big’ birthdays that mark ‘coming of age’ – 18^th and 21^st birthdays - are hard to buy for. There’s definitely pressure to get something that will last and be meaningful. And the further you get away from these ages yourself, the harder it seems to be – to know what’s relevant and significant.  Our default setting is a cracking knife (but to be fair, that’s our answer to a lot of things). We’re long-time fans of Ben Orford knives and, more recently, of Simply Orn8. Yes, we’re sending you elsewhere to buy – but we don’t stock expensive knives that could mark a big birthday (of course if you want a great value knife – the Opinel's we stock would be absolutely perfect – especially the one that comes with a leather pouch). 

The Leatherman is also a perfect gift to mark an 18^th or 21^st birthday (as well as a 30^th, 40^th or 50^th birthday to be fair) – it will come in use over the years and recipients may grow in appreciation for them too.  However, the tool that we probably sell the most of, as a gift, is the Elementary screwdriver.  Of course everyone has a screwdriver, but they won’t have one as nice as this – Edd received it as gift years ago and it only gets better with age thanks the beautiful beech handle. If in doubt, go for the Elementary No. 3 – which includes both sizes – and will be an incredibly well received gift.

Our tool kits are really popular gift options for any ages.  We have sold a number of tool kits for 21^st birthdays – with hammers in custom colours – and the feedback we’ve had has been brilliantly positive.  If the sets we stock don’t tick the box of what you’re looking for, we can always ‘build’ you a kit to the spec you want, to fit your budget – just email us on hello@tinkerandfix.co.uk and we’ll see what we can do.

Looking back on it now, the perfect gift for Edd for his 21^st (or any birthday probably!) would have been a Frank Tool Roll filled with King Dick spanners (or just the tool roll and each year after to add the gift of a spanner… means you have 10 birthdays sorted!)

Gifts for gardeners, our advice would be – buy one thing well – a cracking pair of secateurs, or a brilliant garden tool will last for years – rather than buying cheap gift sets. Yes, some of the Sneeboer tools we sell are expensive compared to ones you can pick up in a garden centre – but the quality means they make outstanding gifts that will be appreciated and in use for many, many years. Think obscure tools too – the ones that people don’t have, so they’ll like to receive them. I can’t be the only gardener would be chuffed to pieces to get a dandelion weeding trowel, can I?!