Willow basket with French randing and braided border.

You can see I am on a French randing and braided border trend! I love the way the spirals form in this kind of randing, so I selected a Bleu and a Hakuro Nishiki for contrasting colours in the side weavers. I had struggled in Week 6 with too thick willow in my first braided border. Since I practised the braiding technique on the last two weeks’ wire baskets, I wanted to give it another go in willow.

Here is a little rhyme I made up to remind me of the steps for the braided border:

Criss, cross, a stake to ground.

Then leave its neighbour pointing down.

 

I used the dimensions and stake pattern from Jon Ridgeon’s first project in his book and on his website, but after the set up I got artistic with the colours, randing and border!