advent calendar 2021

Gift of the Day: A Lavish English Greenhouse

Photo-Illustration: Curbed; Photo: Retailer

Welcome to Curbed’s advent calendar gift guide. For each of the 25 weekdays before Christmas, we will be doling out, one by one, the gifts recommended by dozens of design bigwigs with extremely good taste. So keep checking in daily for new drops.

“This would be a dream-come-true gift for my husband Stephen,” says Bob Williams, co-founder of Mitchell Gold + Bob Williams furniture. “He loves gardening and plants, orchids in particular, and he’d be so happy spending his days there.”

The design’s mix of old and new speaks to Williams. “It’s a classic English greenhouse style, but its simple lines make it feel quite modern,” he says.

At nearly $17,000, this is — needless to say — something of a splurge. But it’s quite solid: Janssens has been producing aluminum greenhouses in Belgium since 1946. (They’re weatherproof and use a toughened safety glass that’s some six times stronger than normal glass.)

And it’s something Williams imagines could be used for more than planting orchids (or ferns, zucchini, or eggplant). “I can imagine us having coffee there in the morning and cocktails at night,” Williams says.

Gift of the Day: A Lavish English Greenhouse