July Artist of the month at Intersections Textile Learning Center Lois Beach, a retired journalist, was an active basket maker for 25 years. She demonstrated at schools in Bryan and College Station, at Fanthorp Inn in Anderson, at Independence, and Washington on the Brazos. Lois taught more than 25 classes for College Station Parks and Recreation, at a Texas Elderhostel, and also gave private basket making classes. Her background includes basket making classes at Arrowmont School in Tennessee, John Campbell School in North Carolina, in West Virginia, and with a Cherokee basket maker in Oklahoma. She also studied Shaker and Canterbury Lightship baskets with John McGuire and Martha Weatherbee. She is a longtime member of the Brazos Spinners and Weavers Guild and for many years has headed up their outreach to Habitat for Humanity.
She also enjoys inkle loom and kumihimo weaving. Besides collecting baskets she has an interest in how American basket makers have been influenced by immigrants who brought the craft to this country and adapted it to local materials.
