Weaving Wild Baskets: The Book

Weaving Wild Baskets is the culmination of fifteen years of time spent wading through cattail marshes, pulling vines from trees, and fiddling with leaves every chance I could get. Learning everything I could about basketry. Perfecting my skills. Exploring plants everywhere I traveled. During this time, I learned everything I could about basketry—refining my skills, studying plants wherever I traveled, and moving beyond simply following patterns to truly understand how to work with bark, roots, vines, leaves, shoots, and fibers gathered from the land.

Alongside this fieldwork I was also teaching. Over the years thousands of students have come through my classes, whether it was a one day workshop or participating in multiple years of my 9 Month Wild Basketry Program. This time spent teaching played a major role in my ability to clearly communicate how to find, forage, and make baskets with wild plants. After all this time I’m so thrilled to have been able to compile all my knowledge (ok maybe not all, but a whole lot of it) into 320 pages of wild foraged basketry.

In the book you will find:

• Detailed plant profiles of some of the best basketry plants out there. I chose my favorite plants that are widespread, excellent for basketry and are easy to harvest. This includes basswood, dogbane, wisteria, cattails, white pine-I could go on for so long!

• Guidance on finding and harvesting a wide range of basketry materials, including vines, bark, leaves and grasses, woody stems, and fiber plants.

• Step-by-step instruction in ten foundational basketry techniques that are especially useful for beginners and widely practiced around the world, including cordage, multi-strand braiding, coiling, looping, twining, wickerwork, random weave, ribbed baskets, folded bark, and diagonal plaiting.

• Fourteen projects suitable for beginners as well as experienced basketmakers interested in exploring new techniques or materials. Some are classic basket forms, such as twined and wicker baskets, while others are original designs created to highlight easy-to-find plants, including the Grapevine Harvest Basket.

Bringing this book together was a multi-year effort that would not have been possible without the team at Storey Publishing. From photographing projects and fieldwork to editing an extensive manuscript, their care, dedication, and attention to detail continue to amaze me. I am deeply grateful to have worked with a publisher so committed to creating high-quality books.