Japanese Ikebana Basket with Burled Handle

This dramatic bamboo basket is a late-Meiji period flower basket (hanakago) designed especially for ikebana, the Japanese art of floral arrangement. The gorgeous basket is masterfully woven of smoked bamboo (susutake) with a freeform weave and is surmounted by a tall, arched handle of gnarled burlwood.

At once chaotic and controlled, the woven pattern includes a mix of narrow and broad strips of split bamboo, beautifully interlaced to achieve harmonious movement. The basket swells to a teardrop form, with a constrained neck that flares at the lip and a short foot of twisted bamboo. Used to contrast and anchor delicate flowers, this ikebana basket perfectly balances the natural beauty of organic materials with the restraint and skill of an artist's hand.