Unique gift ideas you can find close to home

Unique gift ideas you can find close to home

The winter holiday shopping season is in full swing at shops in Livingston County. 

Small, locally-owned gift shops, boutiques and other retailers abound in the county. Several have particularly unique gift ideas.

From plants that eat bugs to limited-edition T-shirts commemorating nostalgic local businesses of the past, here are four ideas that could be perfect for people who would like something different this year. 

Joey Stinson and his girlfriend Kristin Freshwater run the Killer Plant Company in Hartland. The two hold Venus flytraps in their newly opened storefront Wednesday, Nov. 3, 2021.

For adventurous green thumbs

A new carnivorous plant nursery in Hartland Township has a solution for growing Venus flytraps and pitcher plants indoors.

Killer Plant Co. sells plants and growing equipment online. Local customers can pick up orders at the nursery’s brick-and-mortar store at 3554 Avon St. in the township’s historic village district. 

Carnivorous plants trap and digest insects, spiders and other creatures as part of their diet. They require special growing instructions, including 14 or more hours a day of direct sunlight or light from a grow light. 

To help people grow them indoors, Killer Plant Co. sells special indoor Venus flytrap terrariums with 16-hour automatic light timers for $59.99 plus tax. The terrariums are made for three or four plants. 

A red dragon Venus flytrap, shown Wednesday, Nov. 3, 2021, is one of a number of variants of the carnivorous plants carried by the Killer Plant Company in Hartland.

The nursery sells King Henry, red dragon and Flexx Cultivar Venus flytraps. It also sells pitcher plants, including Nepenthes, purple pitchers and trumpet pitchers.

RELATED: New Hartland Twp. nursery finds niche selling Venus flytraps, carnivorous ‘killer’ plants

Orders can be placed online at killerplantco.com

Brighton shop Wallflower Mercantile carries a line of t-shirts with vintage logos of nostalgic local businesses of the past, shown Tuesday, Dec. 7, 2021.

For those with hometown pride

For those nostalgic for days gone by, Wallflower Mercantile is selling T-shirts featuring logos from three businesses that used to operate in Brighton. 

Owner Natalie Buckley said graphic designer Nikki Bagdady Horn used photographs to recreate vintage logos for Uber’s Drugs, Cardona’s Pizza and Miller’s Sport Shop.  Local shop Ivory Vines printed the shirts.