Types Of Basketry

There are generally five types of basketry. "Coiled" basketry tends to use grasses and rushes.

"Plaiting" uses materials that are wide and ribbon-like, such as palms or yucca. "Twining" uses materials from roots and tree bark. "Wicker" and "Splint" baskets use reed, cane, willow, oak and
ash.

There is always some controversy about the origins of the names of baskets. In times past, baskets were usually named for their uses, the location in which they were made, the people who made
them or occasionally objects that the basket resembled. The Shaker Cat-Head basket, for instance, is so called because the basket resembles a cat's head when it is held upside down, and because it
was made in Shaker communities. Although a square "market type" basket called a Kentucky Egg Basket can be found, the most universally known egg basket is the "flat-" or "twined-bottomed"
basket associated with the mountain areas of the southeastern United States. It was probably used for gathering eggs because the eggs didn't roll in the gizzard-shaped bottom. Evidently, more
people gathered potatoes in a round, side-handled basket than any other; hence the potato basket.

Sometime along the way, someone realized that a shallow basket with a tall handle was perfect for gathering flowers, so today we have a flower or provender basket. The oriole basket only looks
like an oriole's nest -- it is not meant for birds. When it comes to basket names, either a particular name "caught on" and lasted through the ages or it didn't, and was called something different by everyone that used it.

An interesting fact about the age-old craft of basket making is that, while many other crafts have become mechanized, no one has ever invented a machine that can make baskets. They are still handmade, even in Taiwan. It's not even an easy task to mass-produce baskets with the aid of molds, electric saws and sanders, and a multitude of "assembly line" processes. In fact, no one has ever improved upon the earliest and most basic techniques of basket making.

Today, basket makers range from the purist who still fells the trees to make the traditional utilitarian baskets, to the artist-basketmaker, whose interest is primarily aesthetic and who uses and and every material imaginable. Typically, beginning basket makers experiment with many techniques and eventually settle on one or two preferred styles or methods.

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