Virginia’s Anne Scarpa McCauley uses wild honeysuckle in her distinctive coiled baskets, trays and sculptures.
Company/studio: Honeysuckle Baskets is located in Free Union, VA. McCauley, a self-taught artist works from home, mostly outdoors. She began making honeysuckle baskets in 1974.
Artist: Born in Windsor, VT, she moved at age four with her family to the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains in Virginia. One of 11 children, her family raised goats and other animals. At age 6, her job was to take the herd to other parts of the unfenced property, which included fields, woods, brooks and thickets where honeysuckle grew.
In the beginning: While tending the goats, she sometimes made little circles or wreaths for her hair with the nearby honeysuckle vines. At age 12, she made a basket of her own pattern. It is the same one she uses today.
Art & materials: Mostly baskets made of honeysuckle. The honeysuckle, picked locally or on the property McCauley grew up on, is left natural (no coloring or finish added) and changes from green to a straw color.
What’s popular: Leaf baskets, $67 to $4,000.
Other favorites: Various sizes of hearts, wreaths and trivets ($20 and up).
Process:
- Pick the honeysuckle one piece at a time,
- Skin most of it, sorting out thickness and length. The skinned honeysuckle starts out a light green color and turns gold. The brown color is unskinned honeysuckle.
- Remove roots and side shoots.
- Make the coils.
Most of the basket-making process comes before she makes the basket.
Favorite tool: Her hands, which she greatly enjoys.
Awards/honors: Many over the years, including having two of her baskets in the permanent basket collection of the Smithsonian American Art Museum.
Recent project: Sculptural baskets.
Where to buy: honeysucklebaskets.com. Also at craft shops and galleries in the South (see website for a complete list).
