There is a sense of drama when you receive a gift that has been beautifully wrapped. Professionals know how to make our pulses race in anticipation of what is coming. Beautifully presented gifts that are done with care adds to the moment.
Professionals have their secrets and they don't like to share, but I'll tell you how they do it.
To make a gift look great on the outside you have to figure out somethings that are going on in the inside. Do you have a box for your gift? If you don't toddle off to the nearest party supply store and buy yourself a gift box.
These are the plain (usually white) boxes that fancy shops use, often adding a sticker with their shop's name on to it. They come in many sizes so make sure that you know the dimensions of your gift and that the box will be high enough as well as wide and deep enough. You don't want your gift causing bumps in the box.
You are going to need tissue paper and while plain white tissue paper is very versatile you can go for a real WOW factor if you use a bold color like turquoise, black or red. Here we used a pretty blush pink.
Photography and Content
Copyright Ingrid Talpak 2010
Morestylethancash
Start with folding a piece of tissue paper the same width as the box and placing on the bottom so the tissue paper lays over the sides of the box. This piece of tissue should be long enough to fold over itself on the top. If the box is very wide then use two pieces of tissue.
To make a cushion on the bottom of the box take two pieces of tissue and lightly crumple them so it fits on the bottom of the box.
Fold another piece of tissue into a square and cover the cushion tucking the sides under neath neatly.
Place your gift into the middle of the tissue cushion.
If the gift is very fragile you could put another layer of folded tissue on top.
Bring one side of the paper tissue up and over the gift. Fold the end of the tissue paper on the other side back about 2 or 3 inches so when you bring that up over the gift there will be a nice folded edge.
Using a seal, place it on the edge of the tissue to adhere the two side pieces.Stickers, like gold seals or round dots are needed to seal the top of the tissue paper. You could skip this but it does add a lot to the presentation. If the box gapes open when you close it you can also add a seal there instead of using scotch tape.
You need to measure out how much wrapping paper you need and I have always found it more convenient to just use a piece of string to get the rough measurement.
A tip from the pros is buy solid colored wrapping paper as you can get a lot of mileage from it. Printed wrapping paper is fun and can be quite amusing but if you are going for a wow factor then a plain color or a color with just a subtle design on it is the way to go. With wrapping paper if it is very thin and cheap then any crease or wrinkle will show the white of the paper underneath so make sure the paper is of a decent weight and quality.
Gently turn your gift upside down and place in the center of your wrapping paper with the good side of the paper down on the table. Pull one side over the gift and pull it snug then tape the middle to the box.
Fold over about 1/2 inch of the paper on the other side and then pull it snuggly over the gift and tape it to the center.
Push the paper over the side and crease it against the box. If the wrapping paper is
longer than the side of the box then trim it or you will get a messy finish.
Push in the sides and crease them. Add a small piece of scotch tape to keep it all flat to the box.
Fold up the last side and crease the edge to the box. If you have double sided tape this gives the fold a nice finish. I will use glue to glue down the fold so I know that there will be no gaps.
While beautiful satin ribbon has a gorgeous sheen and texture to it I often end up using Indoor/Outdoor ribbon because it comes in many colors, it is wide and when made into a bow it stands up beautifully but it wrinkles and creases very easily. It would be best to start with a nice satin ribbon that you can iron out if your over crease it or make mistakes.
Place your gift right side up and slip a long length of ribbon under neath it. If you are not sure how long the ribbon should be use a piece of string to measure.
Pull equal lengths of the ribbon across each other and pull snug.
You want to crease the ribbon in the center.
On the back of the box make sure that you neatly tape the ribbon down on top of itself.
You are going to have to learn how to make a florist bow (it's easy).Follow the instructions here. The bow that was made for this gift was made with four loops on each side instead of the standard three that is used in most florist bows. This was to make the bow look fuller and so it would stand up.
The last thing you need to do is slip a card under the bow. I have been given the compliment when handing someone their gift that they did not want to unwrap it right away but wanted to enjoy looking at it for a while.When you give someone a beautifully wrapped gift you are giving them two joys. The joy of receiving a gift and the joy of unwrapping something so lovely .
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Photography and Content
Copyright Ingrid Talpak 2010
Morestylethancash
Gorgeous. I appreciate that you take care to learn from "the pros" and apply their techniques and attention to detail to your own gift wrapping! I am hoping to wrap gifts at a holiday sale next month so I'm mentally noting your tissue paper tips. Thank you!
Thanks Charissa! I often find that women and children love getting gifts that have magnificent bows but men prefer something a little subtler. Your tutorial http://www.thegiftedblog.com/2010/10/tutorial-flat-base-ribbon-tie.html - would look perfect on a man's gift, subtle but elegant.
Very cool. I have never seen such a beautifully wrapped gift in real life, I guess I should impress my family for christmas :-)
Thanks for the tips. My wrapping job is never that pretty!
The pillow-like bottom to the box is genius, I'll be giving this a shot. It's not only a great idea, but looks really professional! almost like I paid big money for it :)
I just printed all this out and will try it asap.
thanks very much for your post. Its very useful to see how you can make beautiful bespoke packaging for gifts without spending a fortune.