By Kelly Danver, BA ’14
Shelter yourself from the coming storm of seasonal sales and must-have pitches by shopping early. We even did the legwork for you: GW Magazine’s first-ever gift guide puts a spotlight on gifts that will double as a pat on the back for a fellow Colonial—and, with some of these, even triple as a good deed for someone in need.
Jonas Umbrellas
jonasumbrellas.com
These umbrellas don’t just block water, they reroute it. While traveling in Uganda during his time at GW, Josh Pavano, MBA ’14, was struck by the living conditions and decided to make a difference. The result is a company that creates and sells umbrellas to fund wells, through a partnership with the nonprofit Drop in the Bucket. It takes 500 sales to fund a Ugandan well, and each batch of 500 carries a design that is retired once it’s sold out. Customers can even register their umbrella to get updates on the well they helped build. “This is about creating a larger impact and a close connection with those you are helping,” Mr. Pavano says. “I want consumers to be more conscientious about where their money is going.” $55
Babies4Babies
babies4babies.com
When a parent wraps a child in a hand-sewn cotton blanket from Babies4Babies, both the kid and the parent can feel warm and fuzzy. The company, launched by Kate Marie Grinold Sigfusson, BA ’08, operates with a “buy one, save two” philosophy: Through partnerships with humanitarian and public health organizations abroad, each blanket sale funds the purchase of two tubes of an antiseptic gel used to prevent infection in newborns, often where the umbilical cord is cut. The blankets are made for swaddling—new parents might appreciate the step- by-step instructions on the website—but these could easily suit any number of uses. Ms. Sigfusson also is working on expanding Babies4Babies to include products for older children, which will be similarly paired with lifesaving treatments. $34
Teach a person to fish, and sure, they will eat for a lifetime. But show them how to pamper a foodie and they will eat well. Olio Tasting Room is the place to start. Owner Penny Willimann, MBA ’05, and her husband, Mike, opened their first shop in Alexandria, Va., in 2011—now joined by a second in Middleburg, Va.—which that year was crowned best new retail store in Washington City Paper’s annual “Best of D.C.” reader poll. It’s easy to see why: Small steel drums line the tables offering samples from dozens of drizzling dimensions, from chipotle-infused olive oil to chocolate- infused balsamic vinegar. “It’s an experience store,” says Ms. Willimann. Also available is Olio’s own creation, Silvertree—an olive oil made with a mix of Leccino and Tortiglione olives—as well as pastas, honey, and salts, like the can’t-miss truffle sea salt, which Ms. Willimann sprinkles over salads, french fries, and steak. $5-$30
During her final year at GW Law, Yael Krigman, JD ’09, turned to baking as a stress-release valve. She kept it up after becoming an associate at the D.C. office of an international law firm, where for months her “Monday treats” generated office buzz. Eventually she flipped her hobby and career, opening Baked by Yael, an online store that sells her line of goodies, ranging from cake pops— the birthday staple’s one-bite retort to doughnut holes—to rugelach and bagels. The law firm is still hooked, making a point of continuing the “Monday treats” tradition for the entire office, she says, and Ms. Krigman’s fan base has continued to expand: Her Cookies n’ Cream cake pop bested 11 others in a kids’ taste test set up by Washingtonian magazine in 2012, and later this year she plans to open a storefront, billed as the city’s first “cakepoppery,” across from the National Zoo. Cake-pop packages start at $24.95 online.
Hello, George!
go.gwu.edu/hellogeorge
Elementary school may be too soon for college tours, but it's never too early to put GW on the map. This children's book follows the most spirited Colonial of all, GW’s mascot George, as he goes about a typical day visiting friends and alumni around the university. The book takes readers on a stroll past GW and D.C. landmarks, from Thurston Hall to the Mount Vernon Campus, Gelman Library, the Lincoln Memorial, and the Smith Center, where George cheers on the men’s basketball team (spoiler alert) to a last-second victory. The book, published last year, was written under the pen name Nelson Vernon—a nod both to George Washington’s horse and to his Mount Vernon estate. The book can be purchased online through national retailers such as Barnes & Noble and through the GW Bookstore. $15
Although perhaps best-known as tall, fast-growing panda chow, engineers are putting a new spin on bamboo. Treated with heat, the plant’s lightweight, woody rods can be made strong—like strong enough to support two wheels and a human on the go. It’s able to withstand more stretching and pulling than steel, and is more shock absorbent than carbon fiber, says Matthew Wilkins, BS ’12, MS ’14, who runs the bamboo bicycle startup Pedal Forward with fellow GW graduates Christopher Deschenes, BBA ’12, and Elizabeth Hubler, BS ’14. Currently, a percentage of each sale helps provide bikes to nonprofit partners Bicycles Against Poverty and the Tumaini Fund, which use them, respectively, to help low-income entrepreneurs in northern Uganda and widows and orphans of AIDS in Tanzania’s Kagera province. Eventually they hope to establish a “buy one, provide one” model, in which U.S. sales enable their bikes to be built and then sold at a lower cost in developing countries. $400
Capital Kombucha
capitalkombucha.com
It’s refreshingly fizzy, slightly tart, and fermented but nonalcoholic. The tea known as kombucha, which is brewed with yeast and bacteria, has been enjoyed for millennia, but it’s a relatively new taste in the D.C. area. The three alums behind Capital Kombucha—Daniel Lieberman, JD ’13, MBA ’13; Andreas Schneider, MBA ’13; and John Lee, MBA ’13—say their modern take on this iced tea is the first kombucha to be D.C. born and brewed. Whatever health claims are made for kombucha (consult a physician if you have questions), it’s a drink that’s low on sugar and uniquely appealing, and that’s enough for us. And with flavors ranging from basil lemongrass to mango chili, and an emphasis on fair-trade and organic ingredients, the founders suggest the drink moves seamlessly from the breakfast hour to happy hour. Find it in stores by visiting the company’s website or order it via online retailers, including Relay Foods, Washington’s Green Grocer, and Hometown Harvest. From $3.40
Wild Gourmet Food
store.wildgourmetfood.com
The organic and farm-to-table movements are great and all, but technically there is one higher shade of purity out there. As Nova Kim, ATT ’61, points out: Before there was organic, before there was farming, there was wild. Her business, Wild Gourmet Food, has a mushroom-of-the-month club that gives adventurous eaters that closer connection to nature. Ms. Kim and her longtime companion and business partner, Les Hook, gather selections from the Vermont wilderness they call home. Each month two to four servings of a different dried mushroom, from the familiar (morels, chanterelles) to the less so (like bear’s head), are shipped along with a recipe card that includes details on handling and use, as well as nutritional and medicinal information. Ms. Kim and Mr. Hook—who also collect mushrooms and greens for Vermont’s Twin Farms Resort in Barnard and Pane e Salute in Woodstock, and who have garnered ink in The New York Times Magazine, among other news outlets—offer an array of food packages beyond mushrooms, too, as well as educational walks through the local woods. From $275
Designer handbags and scholarships typically don’t go hand in hand—but then again, purses typically aren’t designed by aerospace engineers, either. Jayne Orthwein is using that remarkable combo for a remarkable purpose: to honor her daughter, Anna, a GW student who died after her sophomore year. In 2009, Ms. Orthwein launched ANNA Bags, which produces the brand Anna Orthwein, and she dedicates a portion of the profits to educational opportunities at the university her daughter embraced. “GW offered Anna the academic rigor and social environment to develop into the wonderful young woman she had become,” Ms. Orthwein says. Anna transferred to GW in 2006 to study biology with a focus on pre-med, but died unexpectedly after a brain aneurysm ruptured in June 2007. The Orthweins worked with Sigma Alpha Lambda, a national leadership and honors organization to which Anna belonged, to establish the annual, merit-based Anna Orthwein Memorial Scholarship at GW. Ms. Orthwein, formerly a senior adviser at the National Institute of Standards and Technology and an engineer at NASA’s Johnson Space Center, is the designer of the Anna Orthwein brand. Each handbag emerges through a painstaking process, first as an oil painting, then wrought by the handiwork of D.C.-area leatherworkers and manufactured in New York. As a result, the business has developed a reputation for combining creative design with high-quality materials and impeccable craftsmanship. The business had the featured handbag of D.C.’s 2012 Fashion, Beauty, and Lifestyle Expo, and ANNA Bags was chosen to accessorize the Thomas LaVone Collection at the 2013 Presidential Inaugural Fashion Show. The handbags are available close to campus, in Georgetown, but also in New England and, soon, London, Paris, Dubai, and Hong Kong. At GW the ripple effect of the business and the memory of Anna widens every year. “When I learned I got the scholarship, everything changed,” says Samantha Bauer, BS ’14, who was the 2012-13 recipient of the scholarship. Ms. Bauer came to GW on an athletics scholarship but left the lacrosse team in 2012 to focus on academics. That helped her in the classroom, but losing her athletic scholarship threatened her ability to stay in school. “Words cannot describe what this award has meant to me,” she says. “It truly has changed my life.” —Buthaina Shukri  |
