Monday, March 26, 2012

A new stairbasket

 Today I got around to making a stair basket. At the last Sale I attended, there were several requests for this type of basket. The starting point was my "pattern" as outlined on the card above. On the left hand side of the card are my figures for calculating the length of the stakes at various positions on the basket. On the right is the number of stakes required when using 1" wide flat cane and 1/2" fillers. Since I had 5/8" and 1/2" inch cane, I amended these numbers as shown in brackets.
 The base is woven to size with the amended number of stakes.
 For the first row of weaving, lots of clothes pegs are used to hold that row in place. The handy house brick is a useful weight.
 A few pegs were used to hold the second row in place, but for the third row on pegs are not needed.
 The 5/8" and 1/2" cane were dyed with home-made walnut dye. The 3/8" Emerald Green cane was dyed with Dylon, a commercial dye.
 I used the blue based basket shown here as a support for the base of the second level of the basket.
 The weaving is almost completed. The handle is in place, the second band of Emerald Green is in place. Three more rows of walnut dye weaving remain to be in place before the rim is woven.
The finished product is now ready for my next sale.

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