Gift Guide · By Occasion

Housewarming Gifts

Three characters for a new home — peace, blessing, and the kind of calm a wall can hold.

The picks

A housewarming gift should belong to the house. Not a candle, not a coaster set — something the homeowner will still see, and still mean, in five years. Chinese tradition has been hanging single characters on new walls for exactly this reason.

安 (Ān) — Peace and Safety

The traditional Chinese housewarming character. 安 is the wish for the home itself — that nothing ever happens here that shouldn’t, and that the people inside it sleep well.

See 安 →

福 (Fú) — Blessing

The character that has hung at Chinese front doors for centuries. 福 is the catch-all blessing for the home — health, prosperity, family — that asks for everything good without being specific about it.

See 福 →

宁 (Níng) — Tranquility

For the home that is meant to be a refuge. 宁 is the calm you walk into after a bad day — and the friend or family member moving into a new place will feel its weight every time they pass it.

See 宁 →

Each character is hand-brushed by Artist Lina Sun on rice paper.

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