Romantic Gifts for Designers, Artists, and Architects

Find a special gift for your design-minded sweetheart!

Here are a few beautifully designed or good-graphic gifts for artists, designers, architects, and others of the visual persuasion. Gifts that are a little unusual, a little artistic.

Gifts sure to make them smile.

Roses are traditionally romantic gifts. No designer-type will be disappointed with roses!

But maybe something a little more unexpected?

How about a different kind of flower? Violets are sentimental. Red tulips dramatic and historical. Wildflowers are touching. A bouquet of... artichokes! (Which are BTW flowers.) How about a bouquet of paint brushes? (Now there's a luxury gift.) Or colored pencils?

Or... perhaps flowers as translated by Art?

Scottish Art Nouveau architect Charles Rennie MacKintosh is famous for his beautiful stylized roses...

This American painter is also famous for flowers... in paintings so modern, so stylized, that the flowers sometimes become abstract. This particular painting is less art-history-book iconic... but I love it.

The Dutch painters of the renaissance are famous for floral still lives. And Van Gogh? Sunflowers! And, not quite as famous, but perhaps more lovely and romantic, his paintings of blossoming trees.

How about REAL flowers?

Always romantic!

Designed by modern master AAlvar AAlto, these vases are sure to present fresh flowers with both romance and beautiful design.

This British Arts & Crafts designer is famous for (among other things) floral designs that were used on textiles and wallpapers.

From the same Victorian period as William Morris's work, come these PreRaphaelite painters... and images of knights and ladies, nymphs, and Shakespearean lovers so swoonily romantic that what art-minded sweetheart could resist?

This BBC mini-series is a romp through the (more-or-less-accurate) history of the Pre-Rapaelites and their art-models. Follow their work-lives and their love-lives as they find fame and fortune and... generally behave like idiots. Appealing actors, great production. Funny, nutsy, sometimes romantic, (often sexy), sometimes sad... always entertaining.

Watch with your designer-sweetheart and some chocolate.

Oh, go for broke - get a Botticelli Venus. What's more romantic than the goddess of love herself?

(I received Botticelli Venus socks once - a truly romantic gift!)

And don't forget Venus's side-kick Cupid!

This modern artist is famous for (among other things) his "heart" graphics. But I think this one is just as romantic.

From the most famous modern street and graffiti artist, Banksy, this surprisingly tender moment...

Okay, not stictly-speaking romantic... but so lively and happy it makes you smile. Art from the incomparable modern master Alexander Calder.

Not every sweetheart likes doilies and lace, right?

A one-of-a-kind gift (well, it's the last one in stock anyway), this watch's face is decorated with drawings by the famous architect Frank Gehry. (STARchitect we call 'em) Gehry designed, among other things, the concert hall in LA and a little museum in Bilbao.

Gorgeous.

Somehow the idea of valentines seems sweet and nostalgic... Here are some vintage and Victorian versions.

Go all out old-fashioned romantic and go really Victorian!

Just watch... often posters by Mucha will pop up here. Tres romantique!

What design-style should Romance take?

Or go modern with playful, yet serious, design...

You love them for their artistic soul! Give 'em a treasure chest for the tools of their trade.