A milestone worth celebrating
7th Anniversary Gifts
Wool and copper are the traditional gifts and desk sets the modern theme. Onyx black is the traditional seventh anniversary colour.
A genuine black rose, finished with a lustrous glaze and 24 karat gold, is a lasting way to mark your first seven years together.
The meaning behind your year
Gift ideas
Wool, Copper and Onyx: Six Anniversary Gift Ideas
A few traditional, a few practical, and all of them better with a note attached.
Merino for the one who runs cold
Every couple has one. Choose a merino throw big enough for the couch and both of you. The fibres are fine enough to feel soft against bare skin.
A jumper in their colour
Hallmark suggests a jumper in the colour of their eyes, which is harder than it sounds and lovely when you get it right. A keen knitter will be just as happy with a basket of good yarn.
A copper pan for Sunday cooking
A copper saucepan for the risotto you always make together, or a pair of copper mugs for drinks on the deck. Hang the pan where you can see it; it’s too good-looking for a cupboard.
A weekend on the Copper Coast
Wallaroo, Kadina and Moonta on South Australia’s Yorke Peninsula grew up around copper found in 1859 and 1861, and the area is still called Little Cornwall after its Cornish miners. Go in May of an odd-numbered year to catch the Kernewek Lowender Cornish festival.
A desk set for writing letters
Desk sets are the modern seventh anniversary gift. Put together a good pen, a block of writing paper and a box of stamps, have the pen engraved with your wedding date, and use it to write the first letter.
Black onyx and gold
Onyx is the 7th anniversary stone. Black onyx set in gold suits cufflinks, a signet ring or a pendant, and at 7 on the Mohs hardness scale it’s tough enough for everyday wear.
The black glazed rose
A black rose to celebrate seven years together
A genuine black rose with a lustrous glazed finish, its petals and leaves edged in 24 karat gold and its stem plated in matching gold. Each rose retains its individual shape and character, so no two are exactly alike—a lasting reminder of your first seven years together.
- Includes a certificate of authenticity
- Presented in a luxurious display case, inside a gloss white gift box bearing our debossed gold leaf logo
- A timeless symbol of love, preserved to keep forever
- Rose approximately 30 cm long; display case 34 cm long
What the 7th means
Why wool and copper
for seven years?
Wool is the traditional gift for a seventh wedding anniversary, and American lists add copper. Both are about warmth: wool holds it in, and copper passes it on.
Why wool and copper
Warmth, two ways
Wool is the comfortable material: the jumper you reach for first, the blanket at the end of the bed. By seven years, comfort is something you give each other without thinking, and a wool gift shows you’ve noticed.
Copper changes with time. It starts out pinkish-orange and, left outdoors, slowly weathers to green, like the Statue of Liberty. It also carries heat better than any pure metal except silver, and after seven years, warming each other up is most of the job.
Where it began
A woollen wedding, 1876
In December 1876 the Michigan Argus noted that fashion had lately made a custom of celebrating certain wedding anniversaries: cotton at one year, paper at two, leather at three, wood at five and wool at seven. Invitations were printed on the year’s material, and guests who accepted were expected to bring a gift.
Copper doesn’t appear on those early lists. It turns up on modern American ones, which give wool or copper, while Emily Post’s own 1922 book of etiquette didn’t name a seventh anniversary at all.
Around the world
Copper, wool and a famous film
In Germany the seventh is the Kupferhochzeit, the copper wedding, though some lists call it the wool or brass wedding. When The Seven Year Itch reached German cinemas, it was renamed Das verflixte 7. Jahr, ‘the darned seventh year’.
In France it is the noces de laine, the wool wedding, and the same film was released as Sept ans de réflexion, ‘seven years of reflection’. Dutch lists offer bronze, copper, nickel or wool, and Japan has both a copper wedding and a wool wedding.
7th anniversary symbols
Wool, onyx and freesias
Wool, copper and desk sets
Wool is the 7th anniversary gift on British lists, and a Brisbane paper was calling the seventh the woollen wedding in 1937. Emily Post and Hallmark give wool or copper, with desk sets as the modern gift.
Onyx
Onyx is a banded form of chalcedony, a type of quartz, and its name comes from the Greek for fingernail. Most black onyx is coloured by a method thought to date back to Rome: the stone is soaked in sugar, then treated with acid to char the sugar black inside it.
Freesia
Freesias come from southern Africa and take their name from Friedrich Freese, a German doctor. They’re loved for their scent, but breeding for brighter colours has cost some varieties their fragrance, so smell a bunch before you buy.
Celebrating the 7th
Make a little time for the two of you
Take a picnic rug back to the place one of you proposed, book a class in something neither of you has tried, or spend a slow Sunday in bed with the papers and a pot of tea. Seven years gives you plenty to remember, and a good reason to make time for each other.
For a theme night, make popcorn and watch The Seven Year Itch, the 1955 Marilyn Monroe comedy that made the phrase famous. If you’re near Geelong, the National Wool Museum on Moorabool Street is open every day and makes a good morning out.
Small things count too. A note on the kettle, thanking them for one thing from this year you never mentioned, is a good place to start.
More romantic anniversary ideasWhat the 7th means to others
Letters that capture seven years
Seven years in, you’ve shared a bathroom, a bank account and at least one argument about where the Christmas decorations live. A short letter is a good way to say what you’ve noticed and never quite said. Here are three to borrow from, and three real stories about year seven.
Letters to inspire your own
We wrote these as examples. Borrow any line you like.
Dear Josh,
Seven years ago you said your vows from memory, got one line wrong and carried on as if you’d meant it. That’s been your approach to most things since, and somehow it works.
This year you taught Mia to ride her bike up and down our street every night for a month, and fixed the back gate three times. You didn’t complain about either. The gate complained enough for both of you.
Mum keeps warning me about the seven-year itch. The only itch in this house is the jumper your nan knitted you, which you wear every winter anyway because she made it.
Happy anniversary. I’d marry you again, wrong line and all.
All my love,
Claire
Dear Anna,
Seven years ago we danced to a song neither of us liked, because your cousin was in charge of the music. We still can’t hear it without laughing.
Since then you’ve worked nights on the ward, finished your master’s at the kitchen table and taught me that lasagne is not a weeknight meal. You’ve also never let a day end with us not speaking, even when I deserved it.
I don’t say it often enough, so here it is in writing: you’re the bravest person I know, and the funniest before 7am.
Happy anniversary. Your sister has the kids, the table’s booked, and I’ve ironed a shirt.
Love,
Marcus
Dear Ro,
One: the flat above the bakery in Marrickville, and the smoke alarm that went off every time we made toast.
Two: your dad walking me round the garden to show me his tomatoes, which I’m told means I’m family now.
Three: the year we said no to every hen’s night and holiday, and saved for a deposit.
Four: the house, the leak, and the plumber who went to school with your sister.
Five: Ellie, at 4.12 in the morning, and you singing to her, off-key and perfect.
Six: the hard one. We got through it by talking, mostly in the car, mostly at red lights.
Seven: this one, which isn’t over yet. I can’t wait to see what goes on the list.
Always,
Jess
Worth reading
Real stories and finds about the seven-year mark. Links open in a new tab.
Thomas and his husband, PJ, have been together twelve years and are raising their children in East Tennessee. Their anniversary plan went sideways when they couldn’t find the restaurant gift certificate, so they drove to another favourite Italian place in the next town, talked over dinner about the next seven years, and bought doughnuts on the way out. A short, happy post about keeping it simple.
This 1910 etiquette guide describes one couple’s seventh anniversary party in loving detail. Guests found their partners by following strands of wool through the house, raced to wind yarn into balls, and held a left-handed shearing match on toy sheep. The booby prize was a red mitten full of sweets, labelled ‘A consolation for the worsted’.
Researchers interviewed 123 couples in their seventh year of marriage and again nine years later. Those who felt their marriage was getting into a rut at seven were less satisfied at sixteen. The researchers’ advice is practical: try new and exciting things together, which builds closeness.
7th anniversary FAQ
