Wooden Sleigh Advent Calendar, 24 Drawer Christmas Countdown

Description

Most advent calendars are a box of things somebody else already chose. This one is empty on purpose. It is a wooden sleigh with twenty four small drawers set into the body, each numbered and fitted with a turned wooden knob, and you fill the drawers yourself with whatever suits the person opening them: sweets, coins, folded notes, small jewellery, a rolled up promise to do the washing up.

Build and finish

The body is MDF in a natural, unstained wood finish, laser cut so the runners, the scroll at the front and the drawer fronts are all one considered shape. White snowflakes are printed across the sleigh sides. Sitting at the back is a painted Santa in a red suit holding a gift, and along the top edge a nutcracker, a small tree, a reindeer and a stack of presents. It arrives pre-assembled, so there is nothing to glue.

The drawers

Each drawer is about 1 inch wide, 1.4 inches deep and 0.9 inches high. That is enough for two or three wrapped sweets, a folded note, a small piece of jewellery or a coin, and not enough for anything bulky. Plan your fillings around that before you start, because the temptation is always to buy something that does not fit.

A dimension we cannot settle

Our supplier states the overall size as 8.9 inches long by 3.1 inches wide by 14.2 inches high. Its own size drawing shows the sleigh considerably wider than it is tall, which contradicts those labels. One of the two is wrong and we cannot tell which from here. Read it as a piece roughly 14 inches in its longest dimension and about 3 inches deep, and ask us before you order if it has to fit an exact shelf. We would rather say that than pick the number that flatters the listing. For the same reason we have left the shipping carton dimensions off this listing; the figure our supplier publishes is not credible for an item this size.

Why it costs what it costs

At $143.99 this is the most expensive item in our Christmas Gifts range, and it is worth being clear about what that buys: twenty four working drawers, a pre-assembled body and a piece that comes back out of the loft every year. A filled cardboard calendar costs a fraction of this and is gone by Boxing Day. If you want a one off December, buy one of those instead. If you want the thing that becomes the family calendar, this is the category.

Order it before December

It needs to be in the house before December 1, and you need time to fill it. Handling is 1 to 3 business days and transit is 5 to 9 business days, so order in mid to late November. Our general Christmas cutoff of Monday December 7 is too late for an advent calendar.