Workshop / Course: sagaan: Working with Birch Bark and Crafting Instructions for a Birch Bark Box

Seminars, courses, workshops: Birch bark processing

Discover one of nature's most fascinating materials!
In our courses, we'll transport you to the secret knowledge of ancient peoples such as the Khanty and Mansi from Siberia, the Sámi from Lapland in Northern Russia and Scandinavia, and the ancient Indigenous peoples of North America and Canada. One thing connects them all: for centuries, they knew about the special properties of the leathery birch bark, which encircles the tree in white, glows golden from the inside, and feels soft and supple in the hand.

We want to pass on these old secrets to you and thus keep an old craft alive.

Contact us – we will inform you of the next dates for open courses Work with us to develop a workshop tailored for you!

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Description

Learn to work with the beautiful birch bark in a calm and systematic manner, and discover all the tricks, tips, and secrets of its processing! We offer workshops and courses on processing birch bark.
In addition to public workshops, we also offer all interested parties the opportunity to conduct workshops and courses under our expert guidance. Would you like a workshop tailored to your wishes for processing birch bark? Get in touch with us!

The team:

Our workshop team consists of Ulrike Bohnet and Tim Mergelsberg and can be supplemented with course leaders who are trained in education and craft skills, depending on the requirements.
Ulrike Bohnet has worked for years with high-quality, natural materials, especially from Siberia, and in her ethnological-cultural history lectures transports both children and adults into the world of legends and customs. Furthermore, she has extensive museum education experience and is as knowledgeable about ancient peoples as almost no one else.
Tim Mergelsberg learned the birch bark craft during his civilian service in Russia and there a programme specifically tailored to the needs of Workshop for people with disabilities, He set up a adapted birch bark manufactory in the place where he worked at the time. After his civilian service, he founded sagaan and has been its managing director ever since. The unique concept for processing birch bark comes from him.

 

Material experience with all the senses

Our many years of experience with workshops, immersive presentations and other events focused on birch bark show that this uniquely mysterious, completely natural material, which feels like leather and brings with it not only a golden luminescence but also the scent of the taiga, captivates visitors of all ages.
Our programme offers the unique opportunity in Europe to combine sensory experiences of the white-gold bark with in-depth knowledge and educational work. At the end of the exciting immersion into the customs of the ancient peoples of Canada, Scandinavia, and Siberia, each participant can take their personal unique piece home with them.

Crafting with Birch Bark: The Simple Workshops

Our concept includes offering different levels of difficulty for birch bark processing, enabling participants to create smaller items from birch bark, such as coasters, bangles, and emblems. Those with more leisure time and skill can create their own tin for storing food from pre-fabricated blanks. Our experience shows that this activity provides very successful, intergenerational, and identity-building opportunities.

The Secrets of Birch Bark: Our Courses for Discerning Material Enthusiasts

As well as an introduction to the history, nature and culture of birch bark leather crafts, you'll discover all the secrets this warm and soft natural material holds. You'll also learn why birch bark leather was once as important as plastic is today.
In our comprehensive workshops, we have the time to cover every step of the process, from the raw material as it's freshly harvested from the tree, such as cutting, punching, Cutting threads from birch bark and assembling and sewing the individual parts together using clever plug-in technology to form a vessel of your choice: Lunch box, a basket or a Storage tin – with us you'll get closer to your desire. The rest you'll do – all by yourself!

Our seminars and workshops are ideal for:

The courses are particularly well-suited for organisations and groups such as adult education centres and museums, kindergartens and schools, but also for example outdoor shops looking to engage with a natural material.
Are you planning a celebration and looking for a truly special activity or an exciting children's programme?
Would you like to give your business partners and employees an unusual gift for your company anniversary or for important occasions like Christmas? A workshop specifically tailored for managers and company employees will not only allow your staff and partners to get hands-on but also to connect with you in a sensory way. Contact us!

Private individuals, groups or organisations wishing to run an open workshop and invite further interested parties are encouraged to do so, and we will support you in your endeavour.

Are you interested? Then get in touch with us!

Reviews

  1. Filippo -

    Birch Bark Workshop – A Bloody Beginner's Report

    I was unexpectedly and unpreparedly invited to a birch bark workshop with Tim Mergelsberg through an acquaintance. Until that point, my experience working with birch bark was zero. Generally, my handicraft skills fall into the „complete beginner“ category. So, I was all the more surprised to hold something in my hand after the workshop that actually looked a little like something 🙂

    This is largely thanks to the design of the workshop and the pedagogical skill of the leader. All steps were explained and demonstrated so impressively that their implementation required no effort. At the same time, the guidance allowed enough freedom for individual experimentation and design. Mastering this balancing act between guidance and freedom is far from a given and, in my opinion, is what makes this workshop stand out.

    For me, it was an absolutely rewarding experience and it was simply tremendously fun to work with this fascinating material: a joy for the head, hands, eyes, and nose!

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Questions & answers about birch bark tins

    The birch bark box is classically round and very decorative. It is particularly suitable for serving slices of bread and biscuits in the centre of the table. It can hold a small round loaf of bread or some pastries. After eating, simply close the lid, place in the kitchen - and your bread and pastries are perfectly stored.

    Your good bread stays fresh for a long time because the natural birch bark

    • regulates the moisture balance by itself and
    • mould formation is thus prevented.

    The bark is removed in early summer harvested from living, predominantly old trees. The cambium is not damaged and the tree can continue to live. Nevertheless, it can happen that it is attacked by pests or fungi before new bark forms and then dies over the years. However, it then enriches the largely natural taiga as deadwood and makes room for higher-value species and young trees. This corresponds to the natural vegetation change. Like timber harvesting, bark utilisation is of course an intervention in the commercial forest. As individual trees in the mixed forest stand are utilised carefully, this is not ecologically problematic.

    • The cans can be wiped with a damp clothbut also under the tap rinsed out if you let them dry well afterwards
    • You can wash out the lunch boxes, also with vinegar water, and then place them in the oven at approx. 60°C for half an hour. This kills any mould spores and the tin can be used as before. To prevent mould growth, we recommend our Swiss stone pine grids. We enclose care instructions with every tin you buy.
    • As a rule, the cans take on the flavour of the stored food, not the other way round. This can only have an effect on the flavour if low-odour food is stored for a very long time.
    • No further care is necessaryrubbing with oil is expressly not recommended.
    • The material used for the completely untreated, sustainable produced vessels consists of the outermost layer of the Birch barkthat we know white. In early summer, when the sap rises in the tree, the bark is easy to slit. The white layer is peeled off and the inside is golden yellow; this is used for further processing because it is more robust and durable than the outside.
    • All vessels are handmade and unique.

    They are:

    • antiseptic (Mould formation can be prevented)
    • Waterproof and robust (therefore washable)
    • flavour-tightopaque
    • Mothproof (Swiss stone pine wood)
    • unbreakable, tight closure, trickle-proof
    • light
    • pH-neutral, soft and velvety like leather

    All dry foods, e.g:

    • Tea, coffee (the tins are flavour-proof), herbs, spices, muesli & flour (trickle-proof), nuts, lentils, dried mushrooms
    • Bread, pastries, cakes
    • We obtain these cans from Family businesses in Siberia (not far from the city of Tomsk), Tim Mergelsberg, the founder and managing director of sagaan, has lived in the region himself and is usually there once a year.
    • We attach great importance to good social interaction and fair payment. For example, sagaan pre-financed the purchase of a family's house as a home and workshop.
    • We pay attention to vegan, ecological and socially fair manufacturing processes. No chemicals are used in the entire production chain. Instead, we rely on plug-in and sewing techniques. Only individual products in the particularly flavour-tight Taiga series use some wood glue on the inside.

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