#learning basketry

[balkanradfem]

Basketry part 3: The corn husk and dandelions

So, my dandelion stems have all dried up, and I've been excited to try a dandelion basket. I again, wasn't in the mood to actually follow instructions, it was more of a 'mess around and find out' scenario. So I took the instructions from the Foraged Fibres website (this website is invaluable for basketry I love it so much), and I noticed she had some of the wider stems for the spokes. I didn't have any stems that were wide, so, I improvised, and tore off some corn husks. I put them underwater, together with dandelion stems, and only then my brain registered possibly reading 'don't submerge dandelion stems, just spray them with water'. Oops.

It turned out, dandelion stems, when submerged in water, get very slimy and flimsy, and run the risk of breaking if you put a lot of tension on them. Well who would have known. Weaving them around the corn husks, made me feel like they were going to break, so I didn't put a lot of tension in this basket; I couldn't tighten the husk base. Still, I persevered, and I ended up with this very wonky, whimsy and interesting basket:

I absolutely loved it, but later when it dried, I realized it was quite flimsy and unstable, it could be crushed with very little pressure. But, I was hooked. The next day, I grabbed every dandelion stem I could find around the place, I was now wiser and more experienced, and my next basket would be so much better.

They were taking a long time to dry, and I was offended. So, while waiting, I decided to give it another go just using the corn husks; they did seem like an equally bendy and possibly stronger material. I started making a very tiny basket, but again ran into a problem; I didn't know how to correctly add a new piece of material in. In the first basket, I would just tie the two dandelion stems together, and it was a tiny knot, and it wasn't very visible in the final product. With the corn husks, it was very visible. I pretended this wasn't an issue and finished this tiny adorable basket, with the absolutely perfect rim, and many visible knots on the outside. I still think it's cute!

I looked into how to properly add the material, and figured it out by simply reading the instructions properly (which were, bend the new pieces behind the basket as you weave them in). And then I thought, okay, now I know everything. The next basket will be perfect.

My dandelions were again, ready, but before I started, I wanted to try making cordage for the first time. There were some corn husks leftover from the last basket, and I was eager to try and make a little string out of them. It was extremely educational to do so!

I would have never imagined how strong you can make a cord by just using the power of tension and coiling natural fibres over and over around each other, I was surprised by how tough it was, and just as I was bragging to my roommate about making a rope out of corn husk, I tried its strength and broke it. Which made us both laugh, and made me learn another lesson – they're not that strong unless you're coiling several of them together.

I started another dandelion basket, again using the corn husks as the base, because I couldn't find any wider dandelion stems. Here's my first tiny bit of cordage, and my start of the third basket:

This time, I remembered to just spray my dandelion stems, so they were tough enough for me to introduce proper tension while weaving, and produced actually tight-woven basket! This third one was a great learning experience in adding and removing tension and controlling how a basket will curve or open up. I mean by this, that I realized I don't know how to do any of that and I'm just introducing way too much tension all the time and everything turns out curving the wrong way at all times. I guess that knowledge can only come from more experience.

It turned out the husks were not long enough to make a proper pretty rim, so I settled for a weak version, and to be honest I didn't even execute it correctly, but I was tired, it took me a lot of hours to make this basket.

I have to admit that the level of enjoyment was only increasing from basket to basket; the first one was extremely hard to make, the second one was a short and pleasurable experience, the third one was pure joy (until I realized the rim wasn't gonna be perfect and I couldn't control the curving, then I was like, meh ok).

I also realized I'm very arrogant while learning; I constantly ignore instructions and assume, that despite all of the experience and knowledge people put in writing those instructions, I surely am going to figure it out by myself, or even figure out a better version of it, which is when I usually mess up badly, and laugh at myself. But that's the only way of learning I can stand; I don't trust that the instructions are correct until I've tried things my way first. Then, and only then, I might consider that the instructions are onto something. I'm very distrustful! But also, in some cases, I do end up figuring out an easier way to do things, and by easier I mean, the way I thought of, which gives me special satisfaction so thats easier for me (feeds my ego).

I might indulge and make another miniature basket, they're very adorable and nice to look at, but I hope to use all that blackberry bramble I gathered, and make a foraging basket next. And for these three, I had to find them some purpose, so the corn husk one got to hold little dried flowers, the whimsy one was fitting to hold a little houseleek plant that was already in a container, and the last one is now holding marbles! So they've been elevated to the function of little trinkets, that people can look at your house and be like 'whats this thing' at which point you're free to make up any weird story about its history.

[balkanradfem]

So ever since I saw those beautiful little woven baskets from natural fibers, I couldn't stop thinking about them. My longing to make one superceeded all of my other needs, and I became determined to go out, find some stuff to make baskets from, and figure out how to make a pretty one!

Now, I've made baskets from newspapers, cloth, and pine needles before, so I know some basics, but I never made any from grasses, twine or wood, and the reason why I didn't, is because it seemed like a lot of work! I've seen one video on it, and a woman was describing this weeks long process of foraging, peeling, drying, then soaking the material, and I didn't even have space to do all these things.

However, now I found out you could make baskets from ivy twine, and not just that, you could make baskets from dandelion stems! I'm mad I didn't know about that one before. I figured that baskets, in the end, can be made from pretty much anything that is bendy or cord-like.

I have to admit I wasn't feeling very patient when I made this determination; I wanted baskets, now. So I came out one sunny afternoon feeling that stubbornness will make up for my lack of research; I would go out and drag back whatever material I could possibly bend. And then I would not go thru the hassle of peeling, drying, soaking or whatever it was it needed to prepare, no, I was gonna come home and make baskets immediately. What's the worst that can happen? My basket falls apart? It doesn't matter; I'm after the experience and finding out.

So walking by the riverbank, the first thing I found was thickly growing red water-spurts from some tree. I don't know what kind of tree it is, maybe it's just a big bush, but I noticed the branches were very bendy, and there were so many I wouldn't make any ecological impact if I took some, so I grabbed a handful! Then, I stumbled upon big goldenrod stems, and goldenrod is a medicinal plant, I've known about it for a while, and I was surprised to find just how fibrous and woody the stems are, and how bendy! Wow, I thought, this is even better than those tree spurts, I'm gonna collect even more of this. So I did. Here's my collection at that point:

Then, I went to the place I knew grew ivy, and I got me some of that too. I couldn't get a lot, and it's pretty gnarly, but, I figured I'll cover some stuff I know for certain can be made into baskets.

At the very end, I managed to find a meadow with some dandelions, and collected that too. These, I would have to dry, they're obviously not going to bend while raw, but hey, if it's possible to use them, I want to.

I did have to carry all of this in my hands thru the city, and at first I thought I would be self conscious about people staring at me, but then I forgot that I'm carrying all that stuff, because there were various cats outside, and I was busy trying to get the cats to allow me to pet them (I did get one, it was great.) People were staring at me with some degree of approval; I looked like I knew what I was doing, carrying all those raw materials around. Hehe.

So I get home, and the first material I wanna try is those red branches, I thought it was a good first-time thing to start with, and only then I tried to remember how to actually weave, and realized you need stronger pieces for the spine, and thinner ones for weaving around them. Oops. I was only collecting the strongest spurts. Ah well, I thought, still feeling nothing bad can happen even if I just do it with what I got. And this is what we ended up with:

At every point of this I'm telling myself, okay, but this is still 100% usable, I know it looks bad, but that basket could hold tomatoes like nobody's business if I finish it. It's strong, it's reliable, so what if it looks messed up? Produce wouldn't fall out! This is a good, practical, start to a basket!

And then, I ran out of red branches! So I figure, okay, let's just take the goldenrod stems then, they're the same color, it wouldn't be super noticeable. So I do, and discover immediately why people are not weaving with the goldenrod stems; they break. Yes, they're bendy, but if you try to bend it on an angle, it's immediately breaking. After trying and failing to add 3 different pieces, I had to give it a rest, and face that I would not be having a basket at the end of the day.

I did, however, gain a lot of experience! Lot of my curiosity answered. I'm thinking now, that drying and soaking all this stuff probably adds to the bending properties, and would allow me to manipulate the material more easily, and that's why people are going thru the hassle. It also made it clear that it would be  easier to make baskets using one stronger material as a spine part, and another, more cord-like, as the material to weave around it.

I'm not terribly disappointed, this is how learning works. I'm aware that in order to make any kind of pretty basket, I would be first doing 3-5 very ugly and misshapen ones, but as you can still use those for a purpose, I would be creating practical items! I'm still tempted to go out and gather more of these red branches just to finish the messed up basket I've started, because I don't want to throw it away, it's my first and I love it.

I'm still drying the dandelions and the ivy, so eventually I will be attempting baskets out of these too, will keep you posted! Once I know how to make a simple one, I can try for the more complex ones. I also am waiting to make a few big ones that I can use, before making the small adorable ones!