A Girl Can Never Have Too Many...

Sally Patchins. Not a posh handbag like the Birkin bag (or as they say in the Beijing silk market, a "Barking bag"). It's a basket, but not like its wealthier cousin, the Nantucket basket. Still around these parts a Sally Patchin is a must-have.

Sally (1874-1958) lived in Patchinville, (near Wayland, NY in Steuben County), where she ran a cottage industry of hand-painted baskets from her studio. She did not make the baskets herself, often buying large lots from China and India. Most were utilitarian ~ sewing, laundry and market baskets which she adorned with her designs of birds, and old-fashioned garden flowers (hollyhocks, pansies, delphiniums...) Her work is colorful and cheerful, and some would say primitive.

From the Internet.

From the Internet.

You can't walk into a local antiques shop, or show, and not see the fruits of her labor. Here in Upstate New York, The Wayland Historical Society owns a collection of "Patchins", and Steuben County named her to their Hall of Fame. She received national recognition when the Library of the National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington, D.C., created a file with photographs of her work and information on her life.

One ardent fan owns a collection of 400 Sally Patchins! I am happy to own two.

First and Last ~ From My Collection.

Counting my blessings and my baskets,
Marjorie

(Posting from the Scenic Finger Lakes of New York State, USA)