Creating cordage, binding bristles, sweeping away the mess: Brushmaking with Gemma Stratton
In a world where modern manufacturing often conceals the beauty of everyday objects, Gemma Stratton’s workshops offer an insight into the craft of brushmaking.
With three options to choose from - whisk brush, pencil brush, and hand brush - these enlightening and hands-on sessions will set you up to make many more brushes at home, utilising skills from European and American brushmaking traditions, with locally found (and cost free) materials.
Gemma, who studied sculpture at Canterbury University School of Fine Arts, has spent years exploring this practical craft. Her extensive collection of handmade brushes and brooms, each designed for specific tasks: clearing crumbs off the breadboard, oiling bread tins or woodwork, daily household sweeping or dealing with shavings in the workshop, attests to her passion and practical expertise. There are also brooms throughout her home, hung on the walls to support the soft nature of the Ti kōuka fibre.
German inspiration
Gemma’s interest in brushmaking escalated rapidly during her time in Berlin from 2009, where she lived near a Fabrik where traditional brushes were handmade and brushmaking was offered as a rehabilitation service aimed at folk needing support for mental illness or disabilities. There was a brush available for everything you could think of, crumb brushes, pocket brushes, keyboard brushes to radiator brushes, crafted with a blend of horsehair for the bristles and bound with copper wire into wooden handles. Gemma was inspired, seeing so much beauty and integrity in these sculptural and functional forms.
Discovering and innovating with Tī Kōuka
On her return to Aotearoa, Gemma connected again with the work of Juliet Arnott and the Rekindle team during the Festival of Transitional Architecture (FESTA). Inspired by the use of tī kōuka (cabbage tree) leaves and hazel wood she joined Rekindle, learning to weave with tī kōuka, and soon found herself undertaking a commission for two large lightshade forms for the new Riverside Market. As she wove and the base ends of the tī kōuka leaves piled up around her on the floor, she realised they were perfect for her brushmaking.
Gemma began making brush handles from hand-drilled hazel wood, a material abundant in the Rekindle studio. Greg Quinn also gifted her turned offcuts and experimental pieces from his furniture-making projects as he acquainted himself with the pole lathe. Initially, Gemma created brush bristles by threading whole tī kōuka leaves through holes in the handle and braiding them secure, but soon evolved to lacing the fibre into the handle with cordage, much like the German brushmakers used the copper wire. When she discovered that she could collect the base ends of tī kōuka leaves from weaving projects and process them intentionally - retting the fibres free to brush out - her brushmaking process was transformed.
Instantly useful and a joy to teach
Gemma takes great joy and satisfaction in making an instantly useful object from resourcefully gathered materials, using the brush she’s made to sweep up the mess created during its production, which she says speaks to the deepest intention of her work, to be instantly functional.
A patient and encouraging teacher, Gemma loves sharing her skills with others. She observes that what people get most out of her workshops is in the discovery of the magic and mystery of the transformation of materials. In the beginning, people sit down to a pile of tī kōuka base ends, a bit slimy and slightly smelly it’s hard to imagine what can become of them. They are thrilled to complete their brush, the assembly of Fibre to Handle - strong, beautiful, and useful. Then they get to use it to sweep up the mess!
Gemma’s workshops not only celebrate the art of brushmaking but also inspire a deeper appreciation for the simple tools that enrich our daily lives.
In 2025, Gemma will be teaching her brush workshops at the CWEA: in Ōtautahi Christchurch during March and November, in Whakatū in July, and in Ōtepoti in October.
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