Sweetgrass Basket Making at Coastal Discovery Museum

When we first arrived, we went around the table and introduced ourselves.  Daurus told us about her & her family’s history of sweetgrass basket making and explained all the tools to the group.  We started off with a “starter” basket, seen above.

The baskets are made up of the following materials;

Sweet Grass – found in wooded swamp areas but rare to find in nature now, usually cultivated in landscaping
Bulrush – which is a saltwater marsh grass
Long Leaf Pine Needles
Palm Fronds, stripped

The basket making “tool” was the end of a fork or spoon shown below.  Sawed off with the markings of years of basket making, these “tools” are called “nail-bones”, as historically they were first the ribcages of a cow or horse, then nails and now the end of a utensil.  You could tell mine had years of love and thousands of hours of basket making with it.

Needing a break, we sat outside and played in the fountain, which took the place of the pool when the property was the old Hack hunting grounds.  We walked on the pier and watched for birds and fiddler crabs and walked all around the property – seeing the bee’s that make authentic Honey Horn Honey (available in the gift shop) – walking through the Gullah garden –  and visiting the Marsh Tacky Gullah Horses, Comet & Tadpole.

Wandering around the property, we found Michael Smalls (cousin to Daurus), a Native Island sweetgrass basket maker who sells his baskets at Coastal Discovery Museum daily.  Michael told us tales of leaning the art of sweetgrass basket making from his family and how he decided to quit his job and focus on this art full-time, ensuring he helps to preserve Gullah Culture.