For this occasion
The year-by-year list is older than the gift industry that now sells against it, and the traditional and modern versions disagree far more often than either admits. Here's the run through the early years, with both versions given and the disagreements pointed out rather than smoothed over.
The British list gives a material for every year up to the fifteenth: paper, cotton, leather, flowers or fruit and wood for the first five, as Debrett's has it. After the fifteenth it moves in fives, so most later years have no traditional material at all.
The reading, in order
- The UK anniversary list, year by year
- Which anniversary is it? (free tool)
- Anniversary gifts by year
- The year-by-year list
- What the symbols mean
- First Christmas married
- Christmas gifts for couples
- The 1st: paper
- The 2nd: cotton
- The 3rd: leather
- The 4th: flowers, fruit - or linen
- The 5th: wood
- What to write in an anniversary card
And after that
The stage that follows this one is the milestones: Tin, silver, pearl, ruby, gold. The years that get a party, and what earns a place on the wall.