The best gift shops in Melbourne

Maggie May, an artist specialising in macramé, and Josh Kelly, a jazz musician, met through mutual friends at Bar Open ten years ago. Their friendship blossomed into a relationship and they combined their passion for the arts into an idea for a local business. They opened Think Thornbury on High Street four years ago as a community space and gift shop filled with goods by local artists and makers that make amazing presents for the loved ones in your life. 

For years now, In.cube8r has been a Smith Street staple when it comes to locally designed fashion, jewellery, artworks and ceramics. The way the business operates is refreshingly simple: artists are invited to rent retail space in the store and keep 100 per cent of their sales. It's a place where artists can display as little or as much as they like, and test their wares on the public before expanding their offering. 

Third Drawer Down is a great store for art and weird randomness – the sort of one-off finds that make great presents. You can get a planter shaped like a giant ice cream cone, an egg-shaped maraca by David Shrigley and plates with lovely messages on them. There's an endless array of goodies that would mark your card as an excellent gift giver.

Spoilt offers a wide variety of stylish and modern gifts and homeware products including jewellery, accessories, handbags, bath and body products, baby products and more. Owner Chelsea McIntosh prides her store in having a warm family culture that supports local communities by regularly donating stock and sourcing much-need items for organisations like St Kilda Mums Charity. Surprise your loved ones with beautiful products that they wouldn't think to buy for themselves, like this gorgeous rainbow trinket dish or this bamboo picnic table covered in floral designs by Australian artist Lisa Pollock. 

When you think of friendship jewellery, you probably think of those classic necklaces that are two halves of a heart. While cute, those pieces are pretty childlike, and if you're an adult who wants to show off your friendship with a loved one perhaps you're after something a bit more mature. Lucy Folk specialises in playful and ornate macrame friendship bracelets with plated metals. They look like a far more sophisticated version of those string bracelets you might have made at summer camp. You can also shop for earrings, necklaces and rings.

If your loved one is one of those people who claims to have everything they could possibly want and makes gift buying a pain, get them something kooky from Yellow Octopus. Send someone a venus fly trap kit so they can DIY their own creepy crawlie killer or maybe some bandaids shaped like slices of pizza. 

Louise Olsen and Stephen Ormandy of Dinosaur Designs – makers of distinctively chunky, colourful resin jewellery – have opened their second Melbourne store in the reinvigorated Strand Arcade. The furniture of the store itself is also hand-crafted from resin, and features elements of stone, marble and copper. The result is a suitably unique fit-out for statement jewellery that you can wear for work and play.

Shop directly from Melbourne's best artists, designers, crafters and makers at this Fitzroy-based market. While we highly recommend visiting the colourful market in person once lockdown is over, you can currently shop the offerings online through the directory. Shop for gorgeous handmade dinnerware, vibrant and original paintings and even tasty brownies and artisan gelato that are available for same-day delivery. 

Fun, quirky design at accessible prices is the go at Monsterthreads – a series of gift shops that began as stalls at several Sydney markets. Regular customers love Monsterthreads for the brand’s signature animal designs, which pop up on necklaces, men’s and women’s clothing and wallets; think robot pandas, sailor cats, bears in dapper suits and busking sharks. Aussie designers are well represented too, with everything from cute cycling accessories to statement socks. Price-conscious gift buyers can walk away with cute candle holders, notebooks and brooches for under $20.

Got a friend with a taste for home décor that’s a bit out of the ordinary? At Crate Expectations – located on a leafy side street off Glenferrie Road – you’re guaranteed to find homewares, furniture, paintings and prints that make a statement. Owner Georgina Bird is very hands-on with selecting pieces by local designers and helping customers find exactly what they’re looking for; whether that’s a handmade pastel pink resin bowl by Mornington Peninsula-based designer Keep Resin, or one-of-a-kind printed cushions by Sydney pencil artist Lisa Lapointe. 

Across two elegant and serene levels, the cosy shop features a broad yet considered range of contemporary fiction and non-fiction titles, along with an expansive selection of international imports. It's the place to go for harder to find texts, and if you're not too sure what you're looking for, the staff are more than happy to give you a hand. It also first opened its doors in 1922, so visiting is like taking a step back in history. 

Gerwürzhaus carries more than 350 single-origin spices, salts, peppers, teas and herbs from around the world to choose from, but where this family-owned business really shines is in their small-batch blends that staff mix themselves. The German-style Glühwein Gewürz mix makes it easy to make the perfect batch of mulled wine and the quick butter chicken blend makes whipping up dinner a breeze. You can buy the blends by the jarful or create a hamper of smaller samples.

Melbourne’s Chris Crouch has made his mark on the city in more ways than one. He’s the former owner of Fitzroy North’s Tramway Hotel, cult shop Polyester Records and music label Candle Records. These days, he runs Happy Valley Shop – a collection of carefully selected books, vinyl records, art and gifts. You’d be hard-pressed to find some of these products elsewhere, which is always a good thing when it comes to choosing a gift. 

Nearly everybody likes chocolate, so it's pretty much a foolproof gift. Boxes of chocolate are way overdone, so send someone a bouquet made from Belgian chocolates to put a smile on their face. The business started in Adelaide in 2005 but has quite literally blossomed in popularity and now has a location in every Australian capital city. The brand caters to many dietary restrictions and offer diet, gluten-free, vegan and plant-based bouquets as well. If your friend somehow doesn't like chocolate, Edible Blooms also offers bouquets made of doughnuts and fruits as well as gift hampers. 

This ain’t your average souvenir shop. Forget thoughts of plush kangaroos and Australian flags; this boutique – founded as a pop-up in 2011 by a group of Melbourne creatives – stocks beautiful objects and books made exclusively by local designers. Take your local pride to the next level with limited edition prints of famous landmarks around Melbourne or vintage posters (our favourites are Art Deco-style illustrations of buildings like the NGV and the Manchester Building), gift your friends with the incredibly detailed Buildings of Melbourne Colouring Book or buy your out-of-town buddy beautiful pieces of jewellery. 

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