Gift Finder
Limoges Boxes by Occasion
A birthday, a wedding, a new baby, a thank-you. Here are a few boxes for every reason to give.
Birthdays
Rochard Happy Birthday Balloon Oblong Limoges Box
The balloon got away at the party, of course. It always does. It drifted up past the garden wall, over the church steeple and off toward the hills, while the birthday girl waved goodbye. Somewhere out there it is still floating, still saying Happy Birthday to anyone who happens to look up.
Rochard Birthday Cake Limoges Box Figurine with Balloons and Confetti
Three, two, one, surprise! The lights snap on, confetti flies, and the birthday guest stands frozen in the doorway with a very surprised face. Somebody starts singing, slightly off-key, and soon everyone joins in. The cake is a little lopsided from the excitement. Nobody minds. It is the happiest cake in the room.
Rochard 39 Again Birthday Cake Limoges Box Figurine in Pink
She has been thirty-nine for several years now, and she sees no reason to stop. Every spring the same pink cake arrives with the same single candle, and every spring her friends raise a glass and agree, with straight faces, that she has not aged a day. Some birthdays are simply worth repeating.
Weddings & Anniversaries
Croquembouche French Wedding Cake Porcelain Limoges Box
At a wedding in the countryside, the cake arrives last, carried in by two cousins and a very nervous pastry chef. It is a tower of cream puffs wrapped in threads of golden caramel, taller than the flower girl. Everyone gasps. The bride laughs, the groom reaches for the top puff, and the whole table cheers. Some traditions are simply too delicious to skip.
Just Married Black Car Porcelain Limoges Box
Tin cans rattle, ribbons fly and someone has written Just Married across the back in big white letters. The guests wave from the church steps as the car pulls away. Where to? Neither of them knows yet. Somewhere with a view, they agree, and somewhere with very good croissants.
Rochard Bride and Groom First Dance Limoges Box
The band starts a slow song and the room goes quiet. For three minutes there is nobody else in the hall, just the two of them turning in a small circle, her veil drifting, his hand at her back. Later they will not remember which song it was. They will only remember how it felt.
New Babies
Rochard Pink Stork Limoges Box for a New Baby Girl
The stork took the long way over the village, just to make sure everyone saw. Past the bakery, over the school, around the church tower twice. By the time she landed on the right doorstep, half the street had come out to wave. It's a girl, she announced, and somewhere inside a very tired, very happy family began to cry.
Twins on Bed Rochard Limoges Box, Boy and Girl
One wakes up, then the other. One laughs, and the other laughs too, though nobody knows why. The twins have been side by side since before they were born, and they see no reason to change things now. Their parents tiptoe in at night just to watch the two of them breathing in perfect time.
Rochard Baby in Bathtub Porcelain Limoges Box
Bath time is the best time, according to the youngest member of the household. There are bubbles to pop, a rubber duck to rescue and a great deal of water to move from the tub to the floor. By the end, everyone in the room is soaked. Nobody is complaining, and the duck is safe.
Christmas
Rochard Christmas Santa atop Eiffel Tower Limoges Box
Paris is the last stop of the night, and Santa always saves it for the end. He parks the sleigh on the very top of the Eiffel Tower, catches his breath, and looks out over the rooftops of the city, every chimney glowing. Then he straightens his hat, wishes the whole sleeping city a joyeux Noël, and gets back to work.
Gingerbread House with Candy Canes Hand-Painted Limoges Box
The gingerbread house on the corner has a rule: nobody nibbles before Christmas Eve. The candy cane posts stand like little guards, the icing snow stays perfectly white, and the gumdrop roof survives one more day of temptation. At midnight, the door swings open, and the smell of ginger and cinnamon drifts all the way down the lane.
Hand-Painted Yule Log Christmas Limoges Box
In the kitchen of a farmhouse outside the village, the bûche de Noël waits on the sideboard. Grand-mère made it this morning, rolling the cake just so and dragging a fork through the chocolate to look like bark. The children have counted its little decorations twice. Dessert, she tells them, comes after the soup, and not one minute sooner.
Valentine's Day
Je T'aime Heart Limoges Box with Jewel Heart Inside
He practiced the words all the way across the Pont des Arts, and when the moment came he could not say a single one. So he handed her the little heart instead. On the lid it said Je t'aime. Inside, a jeweled heart caught the evening light. She laughed, then cried a little, then said it right back.
Gold Heart Limoges Box with Purple Bow and Chocolates
Every February, the chocolatier on rue Cler sells out by noon. This year, one clever sweetheart found a better idea: a gold heart, a purple bow, and a little sampler of chocolates that will look just as tempting next February, and the one after that. Not a single one will melt in a warm pocket.
Rochard Key to My Heart Porcelain Heart Limoges Box Figurine
There is only one key, and she has it. That was the whole point. He spent weeks deciding how to say something so simple, and in the end he let the key say it for him. Now it sits on her dresser, where she can see it every morning while she fixes her hair.
Mother's Day & Holidays
Rochard Bunny in a Carrot Car Limoges Box
Monsieur Lapin has never been patient on Easter morning. While the other rabbits hop from bush to bush, he climbs into his carrot car, honks twice, and putters off down the garden path at a scandalous speed. The chickens scatter. The tulips lean back. By the time anyone catches up, he has found every egg and is waiting at the gate, ears flapping, very pleased with himself.
Chocolate Easter Rabbit Porcelain Limoges Box
Every Easter basket has one, and every year someone bites off the ears first. This rabbit has heard the stories and decided to stay safely in porcelain. He sits on the shelf all spring, looking delicious and smug, while the real chocolate bunnies around him disappear one nibble at a time.
Mother Pushing Baby Carriage Limoges Figurine Box
Sunday afternoons are for promenades. Off she goes along the boulevard, the carriage wheels ticking over the cobblestones, stopping every few steps so a neighbor can peek inside and say how much the baby has grown. The baby, for the record, sleeps through the whole parade.
For Him
Pocket Watch Limoges Box Figurine in Gold
Monsieur never wore a wristwatch. He preferred the small ceremony: the reach into the vest, the click of the golden lid, the pause before announcing that the train was late again. His grandchildren learned to tell time by watching him, and they learned something else too, that being on time is a kind of courtesy.
Tuxedo Shirt Hand-Painted Limoges Box
The invitation said black tie, and he groaned the way he always did. Then he stood before the mirror, fastened the last stud, and quietly admired himself. By the time the orchestra struck up a waltz, he had forgotten every complaint and was the first one on the dance floor.
Typewriter Porcelain Limoges Box by Rochard
Clack, clack, clack, ding! In a rented room above a Paris bakery, a young writer swears his novel will be finished by spring. The smell of warm croissants drifts up through the floorboards, the ribbon is nearly worn through, and chapter three still refuses to behave. Still, every bell at the end of a line sounds like applause.
Teachers & Book Lovers
Le Petit Prince Book Rochard Limoges Box
On a very small planet, a boy waters his one rose and tells her about the fox he met. Somewhere far below, a child in Paris falls asleep with this book open on her chest. The two of them never meet, of course. But the rose, they say, can feel when someone is reading.
Sherlock Holmes Book Limoges Box by Rochard
Fog rolls in off the Thames, a hansom cab rattles past, and somebody knocks three times at 221B. Elementary, really. Whoever owns this little volume has already guessed the ending, but reads it anyway, chapter by chapter, with a cup of tea going cold and a magnifying glass close at hand.
Rochard Jane Austen Book Stack Limoges Box
It is a truth universally acknowledged that a reader in possession of one Jane Austen novel must be in want of the whole stack. Here they are, piled on a window seat on a rainy afternoon, waiting for the next proposal, the next ball, and one more sharp remark from Elizabeth Bennet.
Hobbies
Sewing Machine and Stand Rochard Limoges Box
Tante Odile's foot pumps the treadle and the old machine hums like a contented bee. A blue gingham dress takes shape for the village fête, pins held tight between her lips. Her niece sits nearby, sorting buttons by color, quietly learning everything just by watching.
Pink Yarn Ball with Knitting Needles Limoges Box
Knit one, purl two, and don't drop that stitch! The scarf is meant to be a surprise, so every evening the pink yarn hides under a sofa cushion the moment the front door opens. By the first frost it will be finished, a little lopsided and perfectly loved.
Watercolor Paint Box with Building Scene Limoges Box
A rainy afternoon, a jar of water and a box of bright little pans of color. The painter dabs a rooftop, a window, a cheerful door, and suddenly a whole street appears on the page. Outside the clouds hang gray, but inside the town is sunny and nobody needs an umbrella.
Gardeners
Watering Can Limoges Box Figurine with Snail
Early in the morning, while the leaves are still wet, a snail sets off across the potting shed with a grand ambition. By noon he has reached the handle of the watering can. By teatime he is near the spout. He is not in a hurry. The view, he says, is magnifique from up here.
Rochard Bonsai Tree Limoges Box, Japanese Garden Theme
In a quiet corner of the garden, a tiny tree grows the way old trees grow on windy hills, twisted and patient. Each morning the gardener kneels, studies one branch, and trims a single leaf. Then she sits back with her tea and lets the little tree do the rest of the thinking.
Gardening Book with Tools Porcelain Limoges Box
Chapter Four, Tomatoes. The page is smudged with soil and folded at the corner, because this is the book that comes out to the garden, not the one that stays on the shelf. The trowel lies across it like a bookmark. Somewhere between the seed packets and the sunshine, the gardener is learning something new again.