PATA: Blue Tie-Dye Woven Storage Basket
These tie dye pattern baskets feature ribbons of mid blue against a white base, reminiscent of a cloud-streaked Kenyan sky. Produced in three handy sizes and woven from indigenous sisal grass in rural Kenya, these woven storage baskets can be used in many different ways: for keeping your hair accessories and toiletries organized, filled with children’s toys, remote controls and gloves and hats. These round sisal baskets also make beautiful woven planters for your houseplants – and wonderful new home gifts.
The Basket Room is proud to work with weaving groups in several rural corners of Africa, and the talented craftswomen in this particular women’s collective are extremely accomplished in producing these repeat design baskets, using their tape measures to produce three set sizes.
The women behind our baskets have woven from a young age: this meticulous, age-old craft is passed along the female line, from grandmothers to mothers to daughters. Sisal grass is sourced ready-rolled when orders come in, and is hand-dyed in large vats before a traditional twining method is used to produce each basket. Where once these women used to have to travel to Nairobi to sell their woven baskets, today The Basket Room places regular and fairly-paid orders with this most adept group, and completed baskets are stored in purpose-built mud huts.
When you purchase one of these dreamy blue cloud baskets you help us keep this traditional craft alive for future generations of weavers to make a sustainable income from.
Material: SISAL & BRANDED LEATHER TAB
Dimensions (approx):
XSmall: 14.5-16cm DIA x 9.5-11cm H
Small: 19-21cm DIA x 14.5-16cm H
Medium: 24-27cm DIA x 19-21cm H
If you need a specific size please let us know prior to placing your order.
Please note, as this is a handmade product, dimensions & colour may vary from those shown in the photographs.
HANDMADE IN KENYA
Our journey into sustainable style began in Kenya, and the lion’s share of our woven baskets are Kenyan-made. Whilst every region of Kenya boasts its own rich natural bounty, each cooperative we partner with offers expertise in its own unique form of basketry. Weaving, dyeing and grass-rolling techniques differ across the regions as much as basket shapes, patterns and structures. These precious crafts are woven through the generations within families - passed along continuous thread from mother to daughter - protecting and preserving an art form as old as man.
Vast and colourful, vibrant and bursting with natural beauty and style, our fair trade baskets are as eclectic as their homeland and its people. From sisal grass to doum palm, banana leaf fibres to palm leaf, each weaving cooperative works with what is locally available and only what can be sustainably sourced, to produce beautiful baskets which are 100% Kenyan made, and ethically produced. All cow hide bag tags, straps, and basket labels are made from leather sourced as a by-product of the food industry. Natural dyes come from pounded roots, bark and vegetables of the region, whilst all synthetic dyes are sustainably sourced.
From the Kamba tribe to the camel-herding Ariaal pastoralists of Northern Kenya, you can read more about the lives of the Kenyan weavers we work with - and the wonderful baskets they produce - below.
