Woven cane as a method of chair seating was first introduced into England during the second half of the 17^th century. To begin with the holes in the chair framework were very widely spaced apart giving a coarse and unattractive weave. As time passed, the canework became finer and more closely woven eventually giving us the fine six way pattern that we are familiar with today. The popularity of cane as a seating material has remained virtually constant in Europe where even today a good percentage of modern furniture has some canework either for its decorative qualities or for its practicality. In England however, its popularity has largely been dictated by fashion. During the Regency period many "faux" bamboo chairs were made, some with finely crafted cane seats. The Brighton Pavilion was a trend setter, and as its style was based around Far Eastern influences, rattan and bamboo became popular. English furniture manufacturers wanted to reflect this style and so cane seating became more widely recognised. Since then a revival of Regency style at the turn of the 20^th century saw an increase in the number of pieces of furniture using cane, Bergere salon suites became popular with their cane back and side panels and almost everyone had a dainty little cane seated bedroom chair. Many of these Edwardian pieces are highly prized now and therefore the caneworker's art is making a comeback.

There are many more woven cane seat patterns, they are less common and often more complicated - like the snowflake design and the many "close woven" willow style patterns. As the labour cost of creating these seats has always been high, furniture manufacturers reserved this method of seating for only the finest quality chairs. Needless to say such rare specimens now command the best prices but are commensurately more costly and difficult to restore. Below left is an example of a diamond patterned "close woven" seat, in the centre is another variation on the same theme, and to the right is a basketwoven willow type pattern on a vernacular 18th century armchair. 

Stages of the Traditional Weave

If you have patience and like to be creative, traditional canework can be a fascinating and productive hobby. Basically there are six stages to the weave, the first stage is a series of vertical strands passing through opposite holes from the front to the back rails of the seat. You follow this with a set of horizontal strands passing from side to side through opposite holes, then put in a repeat set of vertical strands laid slightly to one side of the first vertical set from front to back rails. It is not until now, stage four, that you begin weaving. A second set of horizontal strands are passed through the side rail holes just as before except that this time they are woven in such a way as to strongly bind the other three strands together. These first four stages are known as the "settings". Now you begin the "crossings". Stage five is a diagonal set of strands woven through the squares created by your settings. It generally doesn't matter whether the first diagonal worked runs from left to right or right to left as whichever you do first, stage six will be the opposite set, and in a nutshell that's it! There other methods of achieving the same star pattern, the Europeans for example use a "steamer" method which entails weaving both horizontal strands of cane simultaneously. Once mastered this can be a very fast way of caning. A diagrammatic leaflet available from us, or a book from the library will show the weaving methods clearly and we would recommend anyone caning for the first time to carefully study these diagrams before even beginning, and to choose a small, square and flat seat to start with. A curved, shaped seat or bowed back will only end up frustrating the beginner.

Have a look at our DVD if you would like to know more about learning canework, see our page Would You Like To Learn?.