Annemarie O'Sullivan & Tom McWalter

The Preserve Journal Photo Stories⁠ ⁠ WEAVE + FEAST⁠ Photos by Chiara Leto @chiaraleto.textiles & Erika Pino⁠ @erika_pino Words by Francesca Farris⁠ @local_raisin_ ⁠ October 28th - November 2nd 2024⁠ at Anna Tasca Lanza Cooking School, Vallelunga Pratameno, Sicily ⁠ ⁠ We invite you to visit our website to see and read the full photo story.⁠ ⁠ CHAPTER 1:⁠ ⁠ The island of Sicily, known for its gastronomic heritage, also has a rich history of basketmaking. ⁠ ⁠ Going hand in hand, baskets were the original containers for harvesting, storing, and producing food. We spent a week exploring plants and weaving in the @annatascalanza garden with makers Annemarie and Tom of @studio__amos . ⁠ ⁠ Studio Amos makes contemporary woven objects guided by a strong design sensibility and desire to live lightly on the land. Their work draws on the sturdiness of agricultural baskets, the curves of the landscape and a deep respect for ancient crafts. Their work is fuelled by the richness of intangible heritage and endangered crafts. ⁠ ⁠ A strong emphasis on connection with nature draws Annemarie, Tom and their studio team to create site specific, beautifully crafted works, which are steeped in history and landscape. They brought this collaborative, playful, and curious approach to a group of willing students at Anna Tasca Lanza for a week in October of 2024. They took us on an exploratory journey of weaving, walking, making, moving, foraging, and eating, intimately connecting participants to the land and each other. ⁠ ⁠ ⁠#ThePreserveJournal #PhotoStories⁠

COME TO LIGHT What began with old coastal forms - woven fish traps, shaped by tide and time - has found its way into our new collection of lights. Each piece carries a trace of those original structures: practical, enduring, and bautifully understated. The SOLAS Collection is now available, and you can find it with our friends @thenewcraftmaker We’re very glad to finally share it with you. Images @jonathanbassettphotography

ON SETTLING To become familiar with a place. To feel at ease. To come to rest. To resolve something. To sink in slowly. SETTLE is a collection of woven objects - lighting, sculpture, a chair, baskets - made from plant materials we know well. Shaped slowly by hand. On show @thenewcraftmaker until Sat 20 June Images @jonathanbassettphotography

IN THE MAKING Our latest collection, from plants to furniture. Start to finish. And a lot of cutting, tying, weaving, and wondering. This is the in-between bit. The messy bit. The good bit. The bit before it all settles into place. SETTLE is currently on show @thenewcraftmaker until Sat 20th June

SETTLE Some things take time to find their shape. In this collection, fibres are gathered, baled, carved, and woven into objects that hold, support, and rest - lighting, sculpture, a chair, and baskets that emerge slowly from plant materials we know and love. It’s a study in balance, texture and the quiet moment when something settles into place. Currently on show @thenewcraftmaker until Sat 20 June Images @jonathanbassettphotography

We welcome @studio__amos into the fold. They will be exhibiting two baskets at our May exhibition. Annemarie O’Sullivan is an Irish basketmaker and designer, known for creating woven objects that reflect the natural materials she cultivates and gathers by hand. She grows around twenty varieties of willow and works with coppiced wood, crafting pieces that honour both land and tradition. Tom McWalter is a designer who works with Annemarie to develop new forms and help turn ideas into objects. Tom brings a light combination of drawing, curiosity and practicality to the design process. He loves to investigate the potential of materials. In the last few years this exploratory approach has extended to natural ink making as a way to understand the landscape. Photography - Petr Krejči / Jonathon Bassett #slowways

DOSSIER LA VANNERIE PART 1 So delighted to be featured on both the front page of Ateliers D’Art Avril/Mai…..And on the first page of this beautifully inclusive article (all in French) showing lots of amazing work by basketmakers we love. Can’t wait to see part 2. Thank you. All our images @jonathanbassettphotography @pieriglemaillot @joehoganbaskets @idoia_cuesta @joannelambstudio @juliegurrwillowweaver @valerie.testuvannerie @monicacistellera @loiswalpole @esmehofman @rosiefarey @studio_herron

TAKING SHAPE Meet our new SOLAS collection - from the Irish for “light”. Drawing its form from the woven fish trap baskets that have lined the coasts for centuries. Humble, purposeful, quietly beautiful. Exactly the kind of thing we can’t stop thinking about. We turned it into a lighting collection. Naturally. Coming soon. Images by @jonathanbassettphotography

IN PRINT It feels quietly special to see the spaces where we live, gather, and make reflected back in print. The kitchen table, the studio corners, the view across the garden - the everyday places where ideas begin. Very grateful to the team at @countrylivinguk Modern Rustic for spending time with us and our home @sussex_craft_house and telling our story so thoughtfully. If you spot a copy, we hope you enjoy a peek inside our world. Images by @rachelwhitingphotographer words by Ben Kendrick

A VERY LATE THANK YOU Some thank yous take the scenic route. While having a bit of a spring clean (and a proper rummage), we’ve realised how much lovely work we’ve never shared— small moments, beautiful light, humble willow doing its thing. What a huge priviledge it was to be invited to show our work at the Cheongju Craft Biennale, South Korea — and to be given the most beautiful, generous space to show our work. These are some of our everyday pieces. The ones we return to again and again. The quiet backbone of the workshop. So here’s a small, very late postcard of thanks to everyone at Cheongju and all our supporters in South Korea. @cheongju_craftbiennale @gorgornia @solunafineart @victor23_99 So grateful to have been part of it. Next stop: Armenia.

WILD AND WEATHERED There’s something very satisfying about turning a prickly hillside into a warm, generous light. Heather isn’t the easy option. And yet it’s been used for centuries — for rope making, baskets, thatching — across Orkney and the west coast of Ireland, places shaped by wind, salt, and very few trees. We love those tough, wiry stems, now harvested slowly by hand as part of a regenerative cycle. Our Great Breck heather light began life several years ago during a residency in Orkney with @thenewcraftmaker , where we spent our days researching the materials that grow when almost nothing else will — oat straw and stubborn, weather-beaten heather. The photos show the whole story — gathering, stripping leaves, weaving, coaxing this wild material into something soft on the eye and glowing. It’s hand-shredding work… but we love it. Our Breck Lights are available in bespoke sizes through @thenewcraftmaker Wild. Weathered. Worth it. Image 1 & 8 @jonathanbassettphotography Image 2 via @thenewcraftmaker

A STEADY CREATURE Our Willow Chair is solid, grounded, and quietly refined — the kind of piece that simply holds you. Settle back and there’s sometimes the faintest creak, like a small exhale, a gentle reminder that it’s made from something grown, not manufactured. It’s one of our favourites to weave, backwards and forwards — the steady rhythm of a four rod wale, packing in dense lines of willow until the form feels strong, generous, and built to last. Slow work. Satisfying work. The kind you fall into. Made in collaboration with our friend @garethnealfurniture — which always means good ideas, good energy, and a bit of fun along the way. Nothing fussy. Just comfort, craft, and a place to land. Available through @thenewcraftmaker Photos @jonathanbassettphotography