Threads 32: How much is your basket worth?

Time and pricing

It is not unusual for people to ask me how long it took to make a basket. It is almost as though the more time, the more valuable the basket must be.

This past week I have been in my museum tidying up and dusting the many baskets.

As I was holding one of my favourite Indigenous baskets,(see below), it occurred to me that when I had bought it, in 1975, it had cost me $20 from the maker, Irene Coogay. She was living on a reserve near Southampton, Ontario. How long had she taken to make this magnificent basket? Making was a very small part of this basket. Here is perhaps how a basket maker should price their baskets, and a real life story of the value of a basket.

Size: diameter 12 ", height 6"

I was in my last year at Sheridan College and my project for a photo essay was to visit an indigenous basket maker and photograph her making baskets. Firstly, I had to find a basket maker. Then I phoned the reserve and asked the band chief for permission to visit the basket maker.

It was a beautiful May morning when I drove up to visit the basket maker with my daughter Pippa. We were welcomed into the house, and immediately the smell of sweet grass was overwhelming. There on the table were two beautiful baskets she had just finished making, obviously in preparation for our visit.

We were shown where her husband had split the black ash and prepared the splints.Unfortunately I knew little about basketry at that time, and there was no mention of whether she had designed the baskets, or how long it had taken her to make them.

Now, almost 50 years later, I look at this basket with different eyes. To make the black ash splints would take time to fetch the tree, beat it down to loosen the layer, trim and cut them to size. Perhaps a day, probably more like at least a day and a half, or 12 hours.

Most of the weavers for the sides and lid of the basket were braided sweet grass. These had been made into a long continuous three strand braid. Absolutely even and no joins are visible.

I worked out how many yards would be needed, an unbelievable 16 yards! The sweet grass had to be collected, and dried before the braid was made. It was then mellowed down, and slowly braided into a long even continuous weaver. Time to gather, perhaps a day. Time to dry and sort out, perhaps half a day. So far the sweet grass has taken 12 hours. Now it has to be braided, perhaps a couple of yards in an hour? 8 hours for 16 yards.