T.A.E.’s (The Adaptable Educator) Book Review – The Ultimate Basket Book: A Cornucopia of Popular Designs to Make by Lyn Siler

The Ultimate Basket Book: A Cornucopia of Popular Designs to Make (2006) presents itself as an expansive, practical craft volume: it combines The Basket Book and Handmade Baskets, adds ten extra projects, and includes new colour photography. The edition is listed as a 192-page book published by Lark Books in New York, and the available descriptions emphasize that Lyn Siler covers tools, materials, and foundational basket-making techniques. 

What makes the book interesting, even from its catalog description, is the rhetoric of abundance embedded in the title itself. “Cornucopia” is not a decorative flourish but a governing metaphor: this is a book about plenitude, variation, and the pleasure of making. Its technical vocabulary—“weaving, plaiting, coiling, twining, and wailing”—has an almost incantatory rhythm, turning instruction into something close to a verbal loom. That cadence matters because it suggests a craft manual that does not merely explain how baskets are made; it dramatizes the grammar of making itself. 

The book’s strongest promise is its balance between utility and artistry. It aims to help readers create “functional everyday baskets,” including forms such as the “Twill Weave Market” and “Double Lidded Picnic” baskets, while also making room for decorative work and a “beautiful brand-new colour photography” gallery. That dual emphasis gives the volume a quietly persuasive aesthetic philosophy: a basket is never just a container, but a visible record of patience, skill, and design intelligence. In that sense, Siler’s book belongs to the finest tradition of craft writing, where instruction becomes a way of honouring ordinary objects as made things, and made things as forms of cultural memory. 

Overall, this appears to be a generous, reader-friendly manual that treats basketry as both accessible technique and artful inheritance. Its lasting appeal seems to lie in that combination: practical enough to teach, rich enough to admire, and structured enough to invite both beginners and experienced makers into the same creative conversation.

The Ikkanbari technique, originally a method of repairing broken baskets by pasting washi paper and reinforcing it with persimmon tannin or lacquer, has been passed down to the present day. It's a craft born from the Japanese tradition of cherishing tools and equipment.

While some Ikkanbari pieces today use imported bamboo or even non-bamboo materials, there are authentic Ikkanbari pieces that are made using only domestically sourced bamboo.
Japan #bamboo #globalmuseum #crafts #basketry

Next Textile Talks (March 18, free, zoom, 2pm EDT): Basketry Now, Revisted (Surface Design Association)

A panel revisits the National Basketry Organization’s biennial exhibition, Basketry Now, held this past fall at Textile Center in Minneapolis. The artworks showcased the best in basketry from across the country and included entries from 64 artists, as far away as the UK, Italy, and Australia.

Info and preregistration link at
https://quiltalliance.org/events/textile-talks/

#TextileTalks #basketry #FiberArt

"Twabs"
Teableau for 02/20/26

That's what crabs were called by certain small persons in my household, so now we all call them that.

#Tea #Crabs #Teableau #TeaCozy #TeaCosy #BarleyTea #MugiCha #MetalArt #Applique #Basketry #Fiestaware #Figurines #Handmade #Sewing

So, I missed the #EAB update from #MaineDACF, but since I registered for the event, I was sent the link to the video update. One thing I learned is that #Woodpeckers are #EmeraldAshBorer's natural enemy. But once EAB sets in, it's too much for the woodpeckers to handle. But if it's an early infestation, they *might* be able to control it! Just another reason to #GardenForBirds and #FeedTheBirds in the winter (and my woodpecker friends LOVE the wormy suet I make for them).

Here's a screenshot from the presentation. Also, the term "blonding" mentioned in the image refers to the process of older gray bark falling off an ash tree that has an EAB infestation, leaving behind lighter-colored newer bark.

The full video can be viewed at this link (includes transcript):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ogbMReBx38

#InvasiveSpecies #AshTrees
#SaveTheForests #ProtectTheTrees #ProtectTheSacred #Stewardship #Wabanaki #Basketry #SolarPunkSunday #Biocontrol #MaineTrees #MaineForestryService #MDIFW