MAKASI: Large Maroon and White Fringed Wall Hanging: 39cm Dia
Woven wall art is an enduring trend in ethical décor, bringing texture to the interior space in the form of beautiful natural fibres. Striking hung alone on a wall and stunning displayed in a group, each of these colourful wall hangings is literally one-of-a-kind.
MAKASI is a maroon and white patterned wall hanging with delicate fringing, handwoven in rural Kenya by a highly talented weaver working within a women’s cooperative in the country’s Coastal Region. Each of these wall hangings is created to the weaver’s own preferred design – each is a work of art.
The Basket Room works with a Community Based Organisation (CBO) which represents these women’s groups, and financially empowers over 500 women. All of the profits from sales - as well as any other money received from donations to the CBO - are used only to offer support to these women’s groups.
The meticulous art of basket weaving is passed along the female line in rural Kenya, and these most creative weavers work to their own original patterns and designs, selecting their own dyes and colourways and enjoying full artistic expression in their work. Sisal grass is hand stripped using wooden tools and the use of weavers’ feet, and then the fibres are hand rolled on the thighs to create a string-like material which is then woven using a traditional twining method. All sisal grass is hand-dyed in large vats of boiling water.
Subsistence farming is the mainstay of these weavers’ livelihoods, but with crops suffering in the dry season – and the dry seasons becoming longer and more frequent - basket weaving is a vital, income-generating craft for these women. By bringing home one of these baskets you play your own part in empowering women to financially support themselves and their families through the dry seasons. Meet the weavers from this region HERE.
Material: Sisal
Dimensions: 39cm Dia
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.
