A gift for a teacher with her own face

This is a gift a class collects for easily, because it is one item and it is personal. A single figurine is €55. Split between 25 children that is €3 each, less than the bouquet every family would otherwise buy on its own. One parent orders, the others chip in, and on the day the class hands over one box instead of twenty-five.

If there are two teachers, say the form tutor and the maths teacher, the couple set is two figurines, salt and pepper, from one photo of them together, for €99. For three there is The Crew at €150, and every extra person is €45.

Nevena S. from Plovdiv wrote that she had not expected such a likeness: one to one with their form tutor, down to the expression. That is the point. We work from a photo. The face is sculpted by hand, the figurine is fired and painted with a fine brush, layer over layer. The glasses, the hairstyle, the scarf: the details the class knows her by are what make the figurine hers.

One clear photo of the face, uploaded from a phone. The class photo works too: upload the whole thing and say in the note which one is the teacher. In the same note, write what the class knows: her favourite outfit, the coffee cup, the chalk in her hand, the phrase she repeats every lesson. The more of that you give us, the faster the children recognise her.

If the photo is not to hand, order now and upload it later through the link in your email. If the gift is for a fixed date, put the date in the order note so we can plan the dispatch around it.

Twenty-fourth of May is the Bulgarian day of letters and education, the day the whole school brings flowers. The teacher goes home with fifteen bouquets and one box. The box is the one she opens first, because it does not look like the others.

Count back from the date: 6 days of making and up to 2 working days of delivery. For 24 May that means ordering by the middle of May at the latest. If the parents only got organised later, choose express making at checkout: the figurine is ready in 3 days instead of 6.

The first day of school in Bulgaria is when children meet their new form tutor, or the teacher who will teach them to read. A small shaker with her face on that first day says more than "welcome": it says the class already knows who she is.

Order in late August so it arrives before the first bell. If you do not know what the new teacher looks like yet, wait for the first week, take a photo with her at the first parents meeting and order then: it will be there for the first class evening or the end of the first term.

At the end of June the class says goodbye to the teacher for the summer or, for a graduating class, for good. Seventh and twelfth grade are the years people look for a gift that lasts. The shaker stays on her desk in the classroom, and every new class that walks in asks who that is.

Graduating classes usually order earlier, because the prom and the exams eat the last weeks. Do it in May, while everyone still meets every day.

The form tutor is the person who knows all twenty-five names, who argues with whom and who forgot the homework diary. They deserve a gift from the whole class, not from the parent who remembered last.

The figurine works best with the details the class knows them by: the glasses on the tip of the nose, the notebook under the arm, the same mug every morning. Put them in the note. If the form tutor is a man, nothing changes: we work from a photo of the actual person.

In kindergarten, the teacher is the person your child spends more waking hours with than at home. The parents of the group usually collect for the end of the year or for the send-off to first grade.

The little ones know her by her hair and the colour of her apron, so those are the details we describe most carefully. A photo from a group performance or a parents meeting is more than enough.

The end of the year comes fast. From order to delivery it is 6 days of making and up to 2 working days with Econt, anywhere in Bulgaria. If you are late, choose express making at checkout. It arrives in a box ready to give.

A customer wrote: "Thank you for finishing the order so quickly and accommodating us." If you have a fixed date, put it in the order note.