Boho Basket

I’m staring at this really ugly wire basket which has been pressed into use in my studio. You may know the kind – available through Container Store. While it is commodious, it isn’t pretty.

Poking around in my linen closet, I identified several cotton woven placemats that are refugees from the eighties. We really liked these colors back then – peach, mint green, mauve and pale blue. They haven’t seen the light of day since I moved them sixteen years ago to our present home.

I decided that the wire which ran the length of the basket would be the warp, and the cut-up placemats will be the weft. The opening between wires are 1 and 1/4 inch.

I cut up the placemats parallel to the warp, and across the weft. It is my hope that the full-length warp threads will keep the strips from fraying. I sewed two strips together so that they stretch down both sides and across the bottom of the basket. Here is the color sequence that I settled on:

After a bit of sewing and weaving, my new Boho-style basket is finished. Here it is, put into service holding yarn:

I like this . And it feels good to re-cycle stuff that’s just taking up space in a closet. However, I must admit to you, dear reader, that this project produced a bunch of lint!