How To Make Flower Baskets By Liza Othman At Isnare.com Ezine Articles

The high-handled flower basket of our grandmother's time is seldom seen nowadays except in pictures. It has gone the way of the old-fashioned bouquet with short-stemmed flowers tightly bound together. In gathering masses of long-stemmed roses from our gardens we shall find a tray-shaped basket more convenient.

Rose Tray of Green Rattan

Materials:

16 34-inch pieces of No. 4 green rattan,

32 16-inch pieces of No. 4 green rattan,

About 16 weavers of No. 4 green rattan,

An awl.

One of the recipes for green dye given in Chapter X may be used to colour the weavers and spokes before this basket is made, or it may be stained after it is finished with green wood stain, according to the directions in Chapter XII of " How to Make Baskets." The large sixteen-spoke centre is made and then the weaving is continued, keeping the bottom perfectly flat, for seven and three-quarters inches. Additional spokes are here inserted, two between each pair of spokes, using an awl to separate them.

When three rows more have been woven the sides are turned upward with a very gradual flare for three and a half inches. The tray shape should be kept in mind always. The basket will then be fifteen and a half inches across, measuring on the outside. Here the spokes are wet and turned sharply in and an inch and three-quarters of weaving with a tightly drawn weaver is made. The edge is then bound off and the following border completes the tray.

In the first row each group of spokes is brought back of the next group on the right and out. In the second row each group of ends is brought over the next group of spokes (above the next group of ends) and in. The third row is made by bringing each group of ends back of the next group of spokes and outside, below the border, where they are cut just long enough to allow each to lie against the next group of spokes.

Basket Fern Dish

Materials: 1

6 46-inch spokes of No.4 green rattan,

8 weavers of No. 4 natural-coloured rattan,

1 weaver of No. 4 green rattan,

An awl.

An attractive centrepiece for ferns is woven of rattan in green combined with the natural colour. The green rattan may be dyed or stained, but the shade should be deep enough to contrast with the natural colour of rattan. The spokes, which are of No. 4 green rattan forty-six inches long, are arranged in the usual sixteen-spoke centre, and the weaver, after four rows have been woven, following under and over the same spokes as the first row, is brought under the first pair of horizontal spokes on the left, over the next pair, and so on, separating the groups of four into twos.

At the beginning of the sixth row the weaver passes under two pairs of spokes, and the rest of the basket is woven according to the Indian method for an even number of spokes.

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