Woodland Craft Courses with Ruby Taylor
Outdoor courses in Wild Pottery, Wild Basketry, and Bushcraft, held in ancient woodland in Sussex, UK. We sustainably forage various wild plants for basketry, dig wild clay for pottery and gather around the camp fire to be creative with our hands.
These courses offer a restorative time out from daily life, as well as a satisfying learning experience that’s rooted in practical knowledge. Courses tutor Ruby teaches how to make useful and beautiful baskets and pottery with a unique blend of in-depth, hands-on learning and reflective connection.
New Book: Wild Basketry
In this book, Ruby brings us into her world of making baskets with wild plants foraged from the landscape.
More than just a practical guide, she explores weavings made by our Palaeolithic ancestors and our animal kin, and describes a connected, reciprocal relationship to harvesting plants and supporting abundance in the living world.
Beautiful photographs take you through a seasonal year of 6 basketry and cordage projects with plants commonly found in the landscape.
Step-by-step illustrated instructions cover a range of techniques, with suggestions for further exploration, giving you a thorough grounding in the fundamentals of the craft.
“An invitation to connect with that wild place in your heart and home in a beautifully rendered way that you cannot resist.” Suzanne Simard author of ‘Finding the Mother Tree’
“An excellent guide by a knowledgeable teacher, a book that is both practical and inspirational.”
Tristan Gooley Author of ‘The Natural Navigator’, Sunday Time bestseller
About Native Hands*
These Wild Basketry and Wild Pottery courses have evolved out of a love of making things outdoors using natural materials, alongside the wish to live in a connected, reciprocal way. And the compulsion to create beauty.
The courses offer an empowering opportunity to learn and develop practical, life-long skills.
Connecting with the natural world, ancestral knowledge and keeping traditional skills alive, are at the heart of what I offer.
Inspired and informed by traditional wisdom in ways of interacting with the living world, we harvest what we need with respect and sensitivity.
Just fabulous. Fun, creative, incredibly informative (Ruby’s hugely inspiring teaching) and in a place of such simple beauty. Way beyond all hopes, an experience I’ll never forget – shared with lovely people. RJ, Brighton
*Here in England the word ‘native’ is used as an adjective to describe belonging to a place. It does not denote a cultural identity.
A short film about why I do what I do, filmed on location in the Sussex woods where I teach Native Hands courses.
“If you are among the tens of millions of people who spend most of their days indoors, embedded in the ‘man-made’ world, it’s to be expected that your concept of life will be largely human-centered.
When you begin weaving more of nature into your everyday existence, however, your sense of life may open up to encompass the much richer, more complex, more communal and more timeless universe that you’re actually part of.”
C. Cook, ‘Awakening to Nature’
I co-founded Native Hands in 2010 as a small educational collective, friends who share a love of the living world, of making with natural materials, and respect for ancestral knowledge. As friends we still meet, share ideas, and inspire each other.
I also offer training and courses for heritage and cultural organisations. I’ve recently worked with:
