'Gee, thanks," is what Jeff Thompson would tell his grandma on Christmas mornings, after receiving a handmade green and red sweater.
He was being polite.
"I used to hold the sweater up before my face, like I was examining it," said Mr. Thompson, a 24-year-old Toronto accountant. "Then I would wince behind it and think to myself, 'What am I going to do with this?' "
This year, he's going to wear the sweater with pride at a party devoted to the holiday monstrosities.
Whether it's a hot-red Santa number with candy-cane cuffs or some other knitted pattern disaster, the homely Christmas sweater always seems to appear under the tree - only to end up in a bottom drawer or garbage bin.
But a growing holiday party trend recycles the garish gift, with tongue firmly planted in cheek: the Ugly Christmas Sweater Party, where whoever looks the worst, looks best.
Also called Robert Goulet parties (after the late crooner famous for unabashedly wearing hideous sweaters), they started with the university crowd about five years ago and have been gaining in popularity ever since. With more than 500 parties worldwide popping up this month in dorms, living rooms and bars, ugly Christmas sweaters are being dug out of closets and are selling fast at thrift stores and on eBay.
Amie Scott, a 30-year-old fashion designer in Toronto, says Christmas sweaters first saw their rise in the 1970s and 1980s. The fact that they are garish and dated is part of their charm. "It's like overzealous Christmas decor," she says, "but incorporating it into your seasonal wardrobe."
Which is exactly why Ryan Gordon, 23, decided to throw an ugly Christmas sweater party in his Ottawa home earlier this month.
He even held a "guess the year" contest for each ugly sweater. "Hmm, 1975?" he asked Erin Duncan, as she ripped off her coat after bursting through his front doors and revealing a gaudy sweater and a pair of green and red flashing suspenders.
To commemorate the bad Christmas gifts, Mr. Gordon plans on throwing a party every holiday season. "My cousins and I each got awful sweaters every year," he says, "so why don't we all wear them as a remembrance?"
Some parties have expanded into the public sphere. Next weekend, Jordan Birch and Chris Boyd are holding their sixth annual Christmas sweater party at the Commodore Ballroom in Vancouver. (Their flyer reads, "The uglier the sweater, the better the party.") More than 700 people attended last December, and they expect more at this year's event, a benefit for a local youth charity.
"We wanted to organize the cheesiest feel-good Christmas party ever," explains Mr. Birch, a professional scuba diver who claims their party was the first of its kind. It started as a house party, largely inspired by the Christmas turtleneck worn by Jim Carrey's character in the 1994 comedy Dumb and Dumber.
Devout knitters aren't offended to see their masterpieces turned into point-and-gawk party garb. Sophie Rosalind, an avid Toronto knitter, takes it in stride, even though it can take three weeks to knit a Christmas pattern.
Still, she thinks there's a better way to recycle the unwanted gifts. "I say, how about an ugly Christmas sweater unravelling party?" she said. "Why let all that precious yarn go to waste?"