“We call cedar smg̱a̱n or aam g̱a̱n, ‘the real tree’ or ‘the good tree,’ because we use it for everything.”
—Kandi McGilton

Red cedar is a distinct and core part of Ts’msyen traditions along the Pacific Northwest coast. It is used for clothes, houses, totem poles, and, importantly, basketry. Across all these uses, its integrity lies in maintaining the overall history and cultural heritage of the Ts’msyen tribe.

Using the endangered Ts’msyen weaving style of Annette Island to create ornate red cedar baskets with false embroidery, Ma̱ngyepsa Gyipaayg Kandi McGilton (Ts’msyen, G̱anhada clan) teaches and shares her practice with others in her community in Metlakatla, Alaska. Her knowledge, gained during an apprenticeship with master Haida weavers Holly and Delores Churchill, is more than knowing how to weave a basket. It is understanding what it means to carry this ancestral knowledge as part of her Ts’msyen identity and why it should be shared with intention.

For Indigenous artists like McGilton, ancestral knowledge can only be maintained with the intention to uphold and use it within Indigenous communities. Intergenerational teaching is integral to cultural preservation and shaping values within practice. It requires learning traditional practices, of course, but it also involves forming connections between the teachers, community, and ancestral history.

And it’s the kind of art and wisdom that was on full display at the 2024 Smithsonian Folklife Festival, where McGilton was among the basket weavers representing Indigenous Voices of the Americas.

McGilton’s journey as a weaver has opened opportunities to fulfill her goal: to pass this knowledge onto people who want to learn and to make sure they use the technique correctly. From being an apprentice to now working as a full-time artist and teacher, she has learned how foundational sharing this practice is to maintaining her community’s connection to their Ts’msyen heritage.

After learning the Ts’msyen Annette Island style from Flora Mather and other women in the 1970s, Delores Churchill wanted to share her knowledge with someone who had intention and would share this practice with others. McGilton’s apprenticeship tested not only skill but purposefulness.

Annette Island weaving, and the community for which it is named, has a unique history among the people of the Pacific Northwest Coast as well. The community of Metlakatla celebrates its annual Founders Day on August 7. In 1887, around 800 Ts’msyen people, led byAnglican missionary William Duncan, relocated from British Columbia and established a settlement on Annette Island in southern Alaska. Here in the Metlakatla Indian Community, families maintained some of their traditions while ceasing others as converted Christians. Like in Indigenous communities across the continent, colonial and religious powers repressed Metlakatla’s community-centered practices, like the ceremonial potlatch feast, and the use of their Native language, Sm’algya̱x. Founders Day is a celebration for what has been given, along with making way for Ts’msyen traditions to be revived, preserving and passing on the community’s ancestral history and knowledge.

The weaving tradition in Metlakatla, though, led primarily by women, continues to evolve, blending with techniques from neighboring tribes. They have shared knowledge with the Tlingit and Haida communities, who use yellow and red cedar bark warps and weave counterclockwise. The Ts’msyen Annette Island style that McGilton uses now is the result of this cross-cultural exchange. It involves weaving clockwise, turning the bark warps with a Z-twist to create elaborate designs on utilitarian baskets. Ts’msyen weavers also use materials including yellow cedar and spruce root.

Despite these innovations, over time, the styles and techniques of neighboring Haida peoples became more prominent, and knowledge of Ts’msyen basketry was nearly lost. McGilton observes that many beginning weavers are unaware of the range of weaving styles and legacies. “A lot of them, I don’t think, really understand that they’re weaving ‘Haida style,’ because a lot of them were taught by Delores and Holly.”

Due to the lack of transmission and preservation, there are gaps in knowledge about the range of art forms and cultural styles. And that means there’s a lack of appreciation for their distinctions. By reviving the tradition, McGilton and her community are reclaiming the past and taking an active part of their heritage. She does this by sharing her practice with others, whether it be simply while she is amid the process or in classes she teaches. Having learned from a Haida woman and now being one of the only Ts’msyen women weaving this style, McGilton’s commitment to preserving the Annette Island style and sharing it with others as distinctly Ts’msyen keeps it alive, thus, also preserving her unique heritage.

“I want this art form to live beyond me, just like how I want the language to live beyond us,” she reflected.

Basketry requires knowledge beyond the techniques of weaving. In McGilton’s classes, like in her apprenticeship, students harvest their own materials. It’s a labor- and time-intensive process, which begins with tending to the cedar trees throughout the year. Before stripping lengths of bark, they offer prayers to the trees for their protection. The trees must be big enough to barely hug, and the strips can be as long as the height of the person working with the tree. After the harvest, they must continue to care for the trees, now bare and vulnerable to the harsh environment.

The bark is split and hung to make sure there is no moisture left, but it must also be pliable enough to weave. With this, students also learn how to create elaborate false embroidery designs, in which contrasting materials are added into the weave, often using maiden’s hair ferns and canary grass. This signature technique, combined with weaving clockwise, distinguishes and preserves Ts’msyen basketry even further. Besides learning how to weave baskets, gathering the materials and caring for the forests that provide them creates understanding and a connection between history and tradition.

“Some people don’t take it as seriously, I think, because they don’t appreciate how much work went into harvesting it,” McGilton said. “It is a personal connection to go out and get your bark, so having students who understand that is more powerful when they go to create their pieces.”

As McGilton both learned and has expressed, being involved in all aspects of basketry creates connections to the ancestors who underwent the same teachings and process. Learning how to weave from others is intangible knowledge, and its connections are invaluable to Ts’msyen identity. To preserve means to be involved, and to be involved is to learn, protect, and pass on what has been passed on to you.

Through teaching and sharing an integral part of her Ts’msyen heritage, Kandi McGilton is creating pride with and for her community in Metlakatla.

Kailee Hall is a program intern at the Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage and a senior art history and international studies major at Hollins University.