Old Ways Training

Basketry Mini Class

 Why We Do What We Do

The ancient ways of the earth are vital to the

human spirit.
Use the Old Ways to find peace, tranquility, and
strength as you go back into your daily lives.
If we spent more time in the woods, we would
find a rare calm that is every person's birthright.

www.oldwaystraining.com
BASKETS are among the most ancient and geographically
pervasive objects humankind has ever fashioned from nature —
and the only craft that has proved insusceptible to
mechanization. (Every basket you see is the product of human
handiwork.)

Pottery often steals the ancient craft spotlight, in part because

baskets are more perishable, but also because they have never
been esteemed, even by their own makers.

Baskets have carried our burdens, literally, for most of human

history. Vessels woven from the plants around us were like
appendages, allowing us to be bigger and more capacious, to
carry things that we otherwise could not.

The lowly basket could even be seen as an absolutely necessary

part of all human history and progress. For without which, the
world-altering development of agriculture might have withered
on the vine: It allowed surplus food to be stored as well as
transported for barter or sale.
The art of basketry is so old that archaeologists don’t know
where on the planet or when in time humans first started
weaving plants and animals together to make a basket.

Every culture in the world has made baskets

of some kind from materials in their environment.

There are many types of materials used in basketry. Some

examples are pine, straw, willow, oak, wisteria, forsythia, vines,
stems, animal hair, hide, grasses, thread, and fine wooden
splints made from pounding a tree’s growth rings.
 Package Contents and Set-Up Procedure

In your package will have:

• 6 #2 round reeds in a bundle
• 1 #2 round reed (that is shorter) by itself • a few coils of #1
round reed.

You will need:

• a bucket of water to dunk your reeds into
• a pair of jeweler’s pliers (needle nose pliers will work)
• a pair of precision snips (a pair of short scissors will work)
 Making Your Basket
1. Place all reeds in your bucket of water, let soak for 1-2 minutes.
2. Remove the coil of #2 reed (it’s the bigger thickness) and orient them, 3
by 3, in a north, south – east, west configuration with the north, south
section on top.

3. Take out one coil of the #1 reed and place one end below the bottom
most east, west reed parallel to it, and “pinch hold” them all in place.
4. Begin to coil the #1 reed down and up creating a “holding pattern” in a
circle around the cardinal directions, do this for three wraps.
5. Feed the tail end into the hole at the diagonal point (i.e.: from southeast to
northwest)

6. Take the extra #2 reed out of the water and fit it through the opposite
diagonal (ie: from northeast to southwest) note: in round reed basket
making, you NEED an odd number of spokes… so we add one.

This next part will be the most difficult to get right and can be quite
tedious. However, understanding this part will help you in understanding
basket making a great deal.
 NOTE: you want to go under the added spoke, so count backwards from
it (under, over, under, over)

7. Begin spreading and alternating the spokes of your basket and weaving
with your #1 reed

Note: After the second wrap, your weave will get easier.

8. After a few wraps around, place your basket with the “tails” facing up in
your palm and push your thumb into it to create the start of your basket
“dome.”
 Transitioning To Another Reed

1. Snip the end at an angle to make it easy to insert into the weave on
the opposite side of the chosen spoke.
 2. Use your pliers to grab and pull your reed tight. Then snip the end.

3. Prepare the next reed by snipping the end at an angle and insert it
on the other side of the same spoke you ended from.

4. continue weaving and adding reeds, shaping the basket as you go.
Note: How much you tension the weave will determine the diameter of your
basket. A tighter weave will create a thinner, taller basket. Keeping your weaves
loose will create a wider, shorter basket.
 Finishing The Rim
1. Snip the spokes to about 3 inches above your current weave and place
your basket upside down in your water. Let soak for a minute or two.
Note: Make sure to cut the spokes at an angle

2. Weave BEHIND the next spoke and down into the basket

3. On the last one, make sure to come from behind.

4. Snip all the tails throughout your basket.

Shaping the bottom

1. Place your basket bottom in the water for another few minutes.
2. Take out and use your thumbs to press in at the center.
 What have you learned?

During the process of today’s lesson, you have learned

many things.

On the physical side, you learned the beginning, middle,

and end of basic round reed basket making.

On the mental side of things, you have learned a skill that

can be done at your convenience. Your mind now has a
focus that can be a source of calm for you.

Take this skill with you into your life and remember its
effect.

Practice this skill when you need calm and focus.

Own your new skill.