Pine Needle Basket
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They're lovely baskets, and quite peaceful to sit and make, but the originals were made using the very long pine needles in N.America, not our wee short ones, and the 'wrapping' cordage is, I found, the hardest bit to source. That said, you can just use raffia, and it works well.
Stuartf did some similar using a hollow bone to hold all the loose 'needles' in place before they were 'stitched' into place.
Have fun though
and we'd like to see the results
cheers,
M
Stuartf did some similar using a hollow bone to hold all the loose 'needles' in place before they were 'stitched' into place.
Have fun though
and we'd like to see the results cheers,
M
As Toddy points out, pine needles vary in length, depending on species.
There's a Dene' woman in our village doing beadwork and needle baskets.
She gets Ponderosa Pine (Pinus ponderosa) needles from 500 miles south of here, some needles are 20-25cm long.
We lost most pine to Mountain Pine Beetle over the past decade or so. 18,000,000 ha dead and cracked.
Lodgepole Pine (P. contorta) needles are rarely more than 6cm long.
There's a Dene' woman in our village doing beadwork and needle baskets.
She gets Ponderosa Pine (Pinus ponderosa) needles from 500 miles south of here, some needles are 20-25cm long.
We lost most pine to Mountain Pine Beetle over the past decade or so. 18,000,000 ha dead and cracked.
Lodgepole Pine (P. contorta) needles are rarely more than 6cm long.
Long pine needles are easy enough to buy online. I played a bit with it when I was on Teneriffe some years ago because they also have a variety of pine tree that produces pretty long needles. You can do the same sort of thing with all sorts of other materials though, dried iris leaves are good for example.
The biggest advantage of using the pine needles is that they are relatively stiff yet still pliable. That helps to give the baskets a rigidity that otherwise can only really be obtained by pretty much totally covering the coils with stitching.
Another alternative is to make softer material into cordage and then stitch those coils together.
The internet makes a brilliant search engine for examples of an enormously diverse range of coiled baskset When I first made them it was a puzzle in a conundrum until I sussed it out, now it's easy to find such an inspiring range of varieties
Recently folks have also begun to use sewing machines to make coil baskets. Soft (not plastic tube covered) washing line is wrapped with scraps of cloth and then zigzag stitched to hold the coils together.
http://www.crosswayspatch.co.uk/books/textile-coil-pots-and-baskets
I find them fun to make, pretty straightforward, and they come together quickly too. Good gift baskets, iimmc.
M
Another alternative is to make softer material into cordage and then stitch those coils together.
The internet makes a brilliant search engine for examples of an enormously diverse range of coiled baskset
When I first made them it was a puzzle in a conundrum until I sussed it out, now it's easy to find such an inspiring range of varieties Recently folks have also begun to use sewing machines to make coil baskets. Soft (not plastic tube covered) washing line is wrapped with scraps of cloth and then zigzag stitched to hold the coils together.
http://www.crosswayspatch.co.uk/books/textile-coil-pots-and-baskets
I find them fun to make, pretty straightforward, and they come together quickly too. Good gift baskets, iimmc.
M
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