A day with Welig crafts

Hi all,

Myself and Paul were lucky enough to meet a guy called Clive Lyttle of Welig crafts at a recent event.

Clive invited the NIBA to come for a course so we readily accepted.

Clive designed our course with bushcraft in mind but he couldnt help but inject some of the fantastic artistry he dispalys in his own basket in too. Of course  it was a pleasure to watch someone with his skill work.

The course was very practical and we quickly set to work selecting and splitting our inital sticks to form the base. Then we were shown the various techniques for forming the base and building up the sides. We only had the time to make a shallow basket each as beginners, but future course promised larger projects.

Clive was allways on hand to provide detailed instruction when someone went array, which was often, and he had infinite patience even when I managed to completely ignore what he had said and insert all of my inserts upside down.

Clive gave us a tour of his excellent site where he grows many types of willow and invited us back to camp in the future.

We managed to bring 9 members to the course so hopefully we will be able to pass on what we learned to the guys who didnt make it this time.

This course is highly reccommended.

A simple basket tray which clive showed us how to make in 10 minutes

Paul, Neil, Stuart and Anne hard at work

Starting out

My base with color contrast

Clive giving his experience

Gary happy at work

Neils base turned out the best in the group. Well done!!

Mine and Garys basket together

My finished basket with simple top border

The gang minus 2 camera shy girls

Cheers