February 1st will be here in only three weeks! That day, all of our 2023 classes will be open for registration and the class descriptions, along with complete information, will be available on our website. The site will be in “maintenance mode” soon, but available again for registration on February 1. Featured on the cover of the 2023 brochure are some of the many colorful splint-woven baskets made by Jeanette Biederman. Thank you, Jeanette, for all the beautiful baskets and equally beautiful friendships you’ve made with us and your students over the past 32 years! Many of our instructors are returning in 2023 and we welcome two new teachers this year, Joyce Gitter and John Rezachek. Both Joyce and John […]
Nothing Gold Can Stay
It was a beautiful fall and we’re grateful it lasted a good, long month. Consider this an ode to the fall colors and scenes on Washington Island. Nature’s first green is gold, Her hardest hue to hold. Her early leaf’s a flower; But only so an hour. So dawn goes down to day, Nothing gold can stay. –Robert Frost Our hearts hold on to the beauty of those colorful fall days until they come again!
Washington Island winter
While it’s still very much winter and with a fresh coat of snow, we’re sharing a few more views of Washington Island before the changeable month of March arrives. From a 1997 Washington Island Archives program titled “What Do You Do in the Winter?”, host Jay Hagen noted that this question is usually asked in three parts. The first is, “Are you an Islander?”, then the second one is “Do you stay here year-round?” and of course, the third one is “What do you do in the winter?” One of his illustrations of life on Washington Island in the winter was this: “If you see a car go by in the winter, you probably know who it is and where […]
November now and then
We’ve had one of the longest fall seasons in recent memory and are still enjoying the sight of many leaves on the trees, especially in those places closest to the water. These late fall days truly feel like a gift! As one of our favorite seasons, it never seems to last long enough. Contrast the two photos, both taken on November 9. On the left, 2021 and on the right, 2018. This is not to say we don’t like winter, but instead are happy with the current weather conditions. It has been 81 years since the “Big Blow of 1940”, the Armistice Day Storm of November 11, 1940. Not being a historian, I won’t delve into all the ramifications of […]
Sit back and enjoy the view
Now that the students in the Bent Willow Chair class are home, we trust they are all sitting back, enjoying the view from their new chairs and feeling the satisfaction of building them by hand, with the help of instructors, Ken and Michelle Workowski. From the prepared willow, ready-to-go, it’s only a matter of a few hours before the chair’s sturdy frame is complete. The next day is spent bending and shaping, bending and shaping until you have the right fit. Ken has been teaching this class at Sievers with Michelle, together as a team, since 2005. The year prior, he had assisted then-instructor Rich Prange in our Bent Willow chair class. That’s a total of about 175 chairs made […]
A good blend
From the very beginning, Walter Schutz felt Washington Island was the ideal place for learning and specifically as a place for Sievers School of Fiber Arts. He wrote in 1979, “What could be more ideal than creating in pleasant surroundings such as these?” Also, “…a positive cultural advance – the Island is ideally suited for this. I am convinced (Sievers) would not be as successful in other places…” and, from 1984, “I hope, too, that it will help you regard the Island with more reverence, help maintain its rustic, unspoiled atmosphere and above all keep it, as much as possible, the sort of place it is. It truly is ‘north of the tension line’ (and) opens the door to the […]
Visits and views
If you’d like a virtual visit to Washington Island and Hotel Washington with Wisconsin Public TV’s Wisconsin Foodie, we understand the episode filmed last summer will be broadcast (at least in our area) on Thursday, April 1 at 7:30 pm. If it is not scheduled on your local public television station, you should be able to view it via YouTube after it has aired. On April 15 (tentatively) is a second episode from the island, this time featuring the Island Café and Bread Company. Although the Island Café and Bread Company is no longer in business, we’re sure the feature will be as memorable as the meals, pizzas and pastries once offered there. We usually send an update on Washington […]
What’s happening at Sievers
Years ago, we submitted regular articles to the Washington Island Observer newspaper using this same headline. Topics ranged from Sievers enrollment, current hours, featured classes, the introduction of our new Facebook page (from a January 21, 2010 article), Sievers anniversary events as well as the notice of a new feature to our website, an online newsletter, which would be added in March 2008. Here we are, sending another blog post thirteen years later. How could the time go by so quickly? One newsworthy item that occurred on March 12 was a major upgrade to our Sievers Benchwork website by replacing the 2002 version with a entirely new look thanks to 3W Media Co. It is much more streamlined and user-friendly, […]
