It’s holiday season yet again, and with much emphasis placed on recent Black Friday and Cyber week deals over in the US, we at The Practice feel it’s only fitting that we compile a little Christmas gift list to get your imaginations going!

But this isn’t just any gift list. No, we’re quite tired of the usual department store recommendations with their cliché slogans- (phrases such as ‘For the Foodie Fanatic’, or ‘Gadget Guru’ spring to mind.) Helpful as these may be in allowing time-poor shoppers to narrow their searches, we often find these selections to be underwhelming. As The Practice team are design aficionados, we’ve hunted down some of the most interesting Christmas gifts that we certainly hope will find themselves under our tree this year!

1.       The Statement Piece

Your iPhone’s ready and poised on ‘shuffle’ to blast your latest playlist. Your cool new serving platters are filled to the brim to delight your guests’ taste buds. All you need now is a seriously impressive sound system to set the scene and put everyone else’s mini speakers to shame. The Practice love this amplifier by London Designer Paul Cocksedge, which looks as if it might just do that. The Volume Smartphone Amplifier features unabashed design fashioned from clear thermoformed plastic, and it can also be suspended or positioned on any flat surface. Even if it fails to deliver on sound, it’s sure to be a conversational icebreaker!

2.       The Reusable Beauty

Every Christmas we love receiving, giving, collecting and seeking out the latest limited edition spirit bottles. For one, (the contents are obviously important!) and secondly, we love to prettify our kitchen counters with bottles that are not only designed with art in mind, but once used can be refilled with water and simply displayed! This year we love Casa Dragones’ limited-edition tequila bottles. The Mexican tequila brand has collaborated with artist Gabriel Orozco, producing a unique design featuring his piece, ‘Black Kites’, a human skull covered in checkerboard. The basis was also to honour Orozco’s retrospective tour shown at MoMa, Kuntsmuseum, The Tate, and the Pompidou Centre. We’d absolutely love to collect one of the 400 crystal bottles, which have also been signed, numbered and dated by hand, although the $1850 price tag might deter us…

An affordable alternative though, are these limited edition Absolut Vodka bottles, which we can admit to already owning a couple of. Still, another several can’t hurt, right?

3.       The Practical and Lazy gift:

We love Casa Bugatti for its retro-inspired kitchen gadgets, from blenders, to toasters, to coffee makers. In addition, one of their latest pieces would make a perfect staple for design lovers who hate unnecessary washing up (that’s us then!) The Uma Scale and Timer is pretty self-explanatory, and apart from the amalgamation of electronic scale and timer, it’s also very easy on the eye.

4.       The Trend-ticking gift:

Comfortable, versatile, and of the moment, we do love our Hi-Tops! But we stopped in our tracks when we saw Nike’s latest beauties in none other than show-stopping electric blue. Featuring a nuback upper and textured leather, The SB Dunk High Pro Game in Royal Blue and Black will make a great addition to our increasing collection. We think they definitely pack a punch.

5. The Present of our Dreams:

From makers of the Zonda, Pagani’s latest offering, the Huayra, clearly needs no introduction. Simply jaw dropping in our opinion, this is one gift that can really only feature in our dreams. Named after Huayra-tata meaning ‘God of the winds’ in Quechua, the official language of the Inca Empire, this is the toy to get any car lover’s heart racing. If its aesthetic specifications aren’t reason enough to lust after this beauty, it also has a 0-60 mph time of 3.3 seconds, and is capable of withstanding 1.66g of lateral acceleration at speeds of up to 225 mph! We can only hope to be presented a ‘wait-list’ document with our name on it come Christmas morning, as it’s set for release in 2013.

If you have a spare £850,000 pounds to donate so we can satisfy our Pagani craving, or if you have any other gift recommendations, we’d love to hear them! Let us know your thoughts on our selection by tweeting to us @PracticeDigital and on Facebook.