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How to Wrap a Gift Using Things Lying Around the House

Guaranteed to have the receiver of your gift oooh-ing and aaaah-ing over its presentation.

This article is part of our VICE Weekends summer series, presented by Weis

All photos by Benjamin Thomson

Just in time for the holidays, graphic designer and illustrator Alice Oehr is here to help us pretend like we're expert wrappers. Through a variety of techniques this handy guide might even make the wrapping outweigh the gift itself. No more weird, unimpressive festive offerings! Surprise your friends and family with a personal touch this decorative season.

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Wrapping is meant to be convenient and should cause you no headaches. I like to use stuff that's lying around the house like newspaper, tin foil and old paper. I accept before I even begin that perfection is not going to happen and try to embrace the strange quirks that inevitably occur during the process. I recommend you do too.

Here, I'm going to take you through some wrapping methods that are guaranteed to have the receiver of your gift oooh-ing and aaaah-ing over its presentation. If you're feeling nervous about your abilities to replicate these, remember that your creation will spark joy for about 30 seconds before being shredded and binned, so just get on with it.

Step 1: Decorate your wrapping paper
If you're using paint, do this step first so it will dry. I buy a cheap roll of something and then let my inner child take to it with pencils, textas, paint, crayons, whatever. If you have an actual child, get them involved! Decorating works especially well when you paint on plain coloured paper, but if you want to pump up an existing Christmas roll, the more the merrier in my opinion.

Don't get stage fright, just start doodling on the paper. It's only one layer of the present and it's going to look great regardless. If you don't feel at ease with a paintbrush, loosely bear in mind a polka dot type of arrangement so you have a rough pattern as a starting point. Boycott all Christmas colours and motifs, you do whatever feels right. Blue and orange? Great.

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*Step 2: Make some 'tummy bands'*
The tummy band works as another layer of decoration to contrast with your wrapping paper. These two extra inches of paper will impress, and means you don't have to bother with ribbon.

Just a basic strip of coloured paper looks great here but if you feel like taking it to the next level, use this technique I learned in kindergarten.

Take an A4 sheet of paper—a page from a magazine looks cool too—and cut a strip off it length-ways about 5cm high. Fold it in half then half again and again, like a concertina.

Draw in pencil the shape you'd like to cut out, or freestyle it if you're in the mood. The main thing you should bear in mind is that the shape must touch the edges with the fold, or it wont be joined when you unfold them.

Hearts, circles, diamonds and flowers all look good in my opinion. Cut around your shape, unravel, and marvel at the results. It never gets old. If you're wrapping a particularly large gift, you might need to join a few of these together to get around it.

And if you don't have any paper or magazines lying around, tin foil works great too.

*Step 3: Make gift card or tags*
Every present needs a card. I don't feel the need to say too much on my holiday cards, so I tend to keep them pretty small. Do whatever you like depending on who it is for, but a word of advice: you should probably make your lover's card a little larger.

To make gift cards, all you need is a pair of scissors, some coloured card, old magazines—really any paper you have lying around is going to work.

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A glue stick and other office supplies like stickers are good, and a hole punch is also handy for achieving a much neater hole than you would by stabbing with scissors.

Start by taking your plain coloured paper and tracing out the shape of a square or circle or star, whatever you're in the mood for. A cookie cutter could help you here if you're the baking type. Do your pencil outline, cut out the shapes and punch a hole in the top corner if you plan to tie on with string.

Next, cut out a bunch of motifs from your printed matter that you think your buddies will like: cars, Minions, dogs, a wheel of cheese. It doesn't matter, it will look good.

Decorate your tags using these collaged bits, draw something, or you could even apply the same painting technique as your gift wrap by freestyle painting a whole lot of card and then cutting your shapes from that.

*Step 4: Putting it all together*
Now, I'm not one to tell you how to actually get your present into the wrap. All I will say is if you invest in some of that nice colourful Japanese washi tape, it will really be your friend here.

No amount of coloured tape is too much. It will hold your present together and add decoration at the same time.

Once you've coated your gift in the paper you customised, add a paper tummy band. If it doesn't go neatly all the way around, just tape it at the back.

Finish off with one of the cards you made by tying it on if you have string, or just slip it under your tummy band.

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Try and think of the person you're wrapping for whilst doing it and get a nice contrast between colours and textures. Go nuts! You can add tinsel and pipecleaners and confetti if you wish. The possibilities for having fun while wrapping things are endless and at the very least, you'll feel good for having done something with your hands.

You can follow Alice Oehr on Instagram

This article is presented by Weis