Happy to provide them pat. It was kinda a fun project.
I did it like this with some suggestions and tips from Scott who had already built one:
built a form for the basket like this:
Then split the cane. and yea Steve it was a pain to split and get long strips. And I wasted a lot too.
I used really green cane. I used up 3 maybe 6' long cane pieces that were prob 1.25 dia. and pretty straight. I didnt do any additional prestraightening. I split with a thin knife stuck in my work bench but at the nodes I used a chisel to break the node and to try to keep the split straight. went slow. seemed to get at least 4 maybe 5 good full length long strips and some strips that ran out out of each cane piece. But for this small a basket all you really need are pieces approx 12-18" long. then I shaped and thinned the cane on a belt sander and put it immediately into a bucket of water.
soaked it for several days as it took time to make more strips. prob could have used it right away.
wove the basket over the form as best I could. cause of the shape and form I dont think I followed the traditional weaving rules as I understand them anyway. ran initial strips across length and width then corner to corner. holding down the cane with a band around the form. then I did the first horizontal set. after a while I just shoved and wove in extra strips that really only go 1/2 way across the basket to fill the wholes and gaps. then ran the rest of the horizontal weaves.
Then I set an inner ring piece and drilled through each strip with 1/16" bit. I used fine copper wire to wire up maybe 6 spaced out places on basket head just to hold things together. then pulled it off the form.
by the time I got the basket to this point the strips were too dry and brittle to fold them over the ends like a traditional basket. they kept breaking when I tried. maybe if I soaked and heated them I could have but not sure. So I just sewed the inner frame to the woven cane with artificial sinew. then I put on one external frame piece and used a needle to sew that one. then one more external ring.
hope that makes sense.
If I build another I will take pics along the way. Or maybe I can talk scott into doing it.
later
wade
