Spring Basket Weaving Workshops at Tyee Arts

This spring, join us at Tyee Arts for a three-part basket weaving series rooted in traditional forms and everyday function. These hands-on workshops invite you to slow down, work with natural materials, and create baskets designed to be used and lived with.

Across the season, you’ll learn classic weaving techniques while making functional forms once used for gathering, carrying, and serving daily life. Each workshop stands on its own, while the full series offers a chance to build skills, confidence, and fluency with the craft and community!

Come for one, or commit to the full arc of learning. Either way, you’ll leave with a handmade basket, new skills, and a deeper connection to a craft that has supported human life for generations.

Workshop Details

• Dessert provided
• Three full-day workshops, each on a Saturday, 10 am to 4 pm
• Come for one or commit to the full series
• $145 per workshop, or $400 for the full 3-class series ($35 savings)

What to Bring:

• 5 Gallon Bucket
• Bath size Towel
• Garden Clippers
• Awl
• Clothespins ~20 (only 5 for Appalachian Basket)
• Heavy weight: a brick or sadiron or find rocks on the land

Come learn to weave a beautiful creation: the Appalachian Twin-Bottomed Egg Basket. This basket, originally designed to fit over a woman’s hips or a horse’s back, was structured to hold eggs in secure lobes to get them safely to market. It is the perfect basket for first-time weavers as it’s woven from the top down, bypassing the need to weave a rim. The basket is easily adapted to become a Melon Basket, perfect for Easter Egg hunts for children.

In this workshop, you’ll weave a Market Basket: a sturdy, functional form designed for everyday use. This basket introduces classic basketry techniques that build confidence and fluency with materials, structure, and form. As the basket takes shape, you’ll gain a deeper understanding of how strength, balance, and beauty come together in a well-made piece.

The workshop is guided by Theresa, who has been teaching basketry for over forty years. Her experience includes teaching at the beloved Basketry School in Seattle’s Fremont neighborhood, along with decades of community-based education rooted in traditional methods and thoughtful instruction.

This workshop is well-suited for those with some familiarity with basketry, as well as makers who feel ready to work with more involved forms and techniques. Theresa offers clear guidance in a calm, focused environment that supports learning through practice.

In this workshop, you will learn to weave a Shaker Cheese Basket using a classic hexagonal or triaxial pattern—a light, elegant form historically used by the Shaker communities of New England to strain fresh cheese curds and dry herbs. Traditionally lined with cheesecloth, this basket was an everyday tool, made to serve real life with beauty and intention.As you work, you’ll discover that this timeless weave reaches far beyond the Shakers. Variations of the triaxial pattern appear in basket traditions across the world, particularly throughout Southeast Asia, reflecting a shared global language of utility, rhythm, and craftsmanship.By the end of the workshop, you’ll leave with a finished, airy basket that’s both practical and enduring—perfect for serving warm bread or rolls, holding fruit on the kitchen counter, or simply living as a piece of handmade art in your home.

This is a chance to slow down, work with your hands, and learn a form that has connected people across cultures and generations—creating something useful, beautiful, and meant to be used.

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Host or Publisher Tyee Arts