Natural Living

Interview:Jane Alexander on ancient crafts

Our columnist explores the ancient crafts that are making a comeback

My hands are twisting and twining rush into a basket. There’s a bunch of us, working companionably around the fire. Someone starts singing, a gentle folk song, and I feel a deep sense of peace. I belong here. Weaving local materials into vessels is an ancient craft and, after a little instruction, my hands seem to know what to do.

Ancient crafts are making a welcome comeback, as we start to recognise the old skills we have cast aside in favour of instant gratification. “When we lost connection to our land, to the deep intuitive knowing that we belonged to nature, along with all other living beings, we also lost our hearts….enough to give us a sense of dislocation, a deep anxiety that expresses itself in an endless bid to possess ‘things’,” says Mac Macartney, founder of Embercombe (embercombe.org) where I am spending a week learning ancient crafts. “When we make, our hands and our senses inform ourselves; remind us of this beautiful baseline of our existence. We establish a link – about being sane and loving.”

We know that crafting in general is good for us. Research has shown it can help soothe symptoms of anxiety, depression and loneliness. It has a meditative quality – natural mindfulness. Yet there’s something even more powerful about ancient crafting – it’s a straight route to rewilding ourselves, plugging us into our connection with our ancestors, with our past, with the earth.

During my week at Embercombe I also learned how to tan fish-skin before stitching it into a pouch. It’s a painstaking, messy process, teaching patience, tolerance and humility.

Embercombe isn’t the only place teaching these skills: also check out Wild Awake (wildawake.ie), The Old Way (theoldway.info) and Oak and Smoke Tannery (oakandsmoketannery. co.uk) for starters.

I love that we’re keen to learn the skills of our ancient ancestors. When we claw out clay from the river bank to make a pot; when we twist bramble into cordage (the original string), we are working in tandem with the natural world; we’re taking our place in it.

And oh, the sheer joy of something you have created in this way! My rush pot (now holding pens on my desk) gives me the deepest pleasure. I am smitten with its imperfections. When I stroke it, I remember the riverbank where we picked the rush; the woodland glade in which we worked, the spark of the fire; my fellow weavers. What shop-bought object can offer that depth of connection?

“Most of us think of belonging as a place outside of ourselves, that if we keep searching for, that maybe one day we’ll find it,” says Toko-Pa Turner in her wonderful book, Belonging – Remembering Ourselves Home (Her Own Room Press). “But what if belonging isn’t a place at all, but a set of skills, or competencies, that we in modern times have lost or forgotten?”

I love that thought.

Jane’s book Ancient Wisdom for Modern Living (Kyle Books, £14.99) is available now. Follow her on social media as @exmoorjane