We all use string, it’s an everyday object, many shops sell it and it has many uses. On Saturday 26th September a group of Orchard members met to learn how to make string out of natural materials.
Our session was lead by a wonderfully knowledgeable lady called Anna Corbett, who has been making cordage and weaving for many years. Anna is a basket maker who loves making string and who works almost entirely with plants local to where she lives in Northumberland. These may be wild or cultivated, from moors and meadows, woods and gardens. They include leaves and stems, grasses, rushes, roots, moss, straw and bark. See scottishbasketmakers.org
She shared her ideas about the history of cordage and showed us how to make simple twisted string from rushes. Once we’d worked out our left twisting from our right twisting we were all able to make our own.
Cordage can be made out of many natural materials. In the afternoon session one group learnt how to process nettles for cordage material and another group made great lengths of rope out of hay and rushes.
It was such a good day, Anna was a brilliant teacher and we all learnt so much about the ancient craft of cordage making.
