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When defined by the dictionary as a bundle
of firm, stiff twigs or fibers bound together to a
handle for the primary purpose of sweeping.
The common broom no longer sounds quite so ordinary.
in fact for some. Like Rob and Janet Schwieger the
broom is anything but ordinary. especially,
given its history, function and more
importantly what it takes to make. Something the
Schwieger's know first hand, as professional
broom makers.
(Rob Schwieger) When early settlers came to
North America they brought broom corn with them,
and made brooms. Ah, in the early
days religious groups tended to have some kind
of affinity to making brooms. The most famous of
which were the Shakers. They actually even
invented what people consider today's
normal broom called the Shaker Flat.
>>Since 1992 the Schweigers have been proud
owners of North Woven Broom, a charmingly small
yet highly successful broom company.
As professions go broom making was hardly
Rob and Janet's first choice.
(Rob) Well it's mostly my
wife's fault. Cause I was working at, actually I was
commuting to a job on the Alberta/BC border,
in the coal mining industry.
And my wife was working with a couple who moved
here and started making brooms and they decided
that they wanted to sell their shop. And, so she
contacted me at work one night when I was at on the
job and said, you ever thought about making brooms?
>>Learning to build high quality corn brooms quickly
and efficiently, by hand wasn't easy for Rob and Janet
early on, but once they mastered that part
of the business what they found even more challenging
was the annual acquisition of the raw materials
needed to make one of kind brooms.
(Rob) We have to bring the broom corn
up from Mexico, and sometimes the materials
aren't as as good as we'd hoped they would be.
And then just crossing two borders is always a little
bit nerve wracking. And it's just a matter of making
sure that we have the highest quality materials
we can get. Of course, when we make a broom
we have to tie it onto a handle of some
sort, and for us, I mean we use all sorts of
different things for handles. We use all sorts
of natural wood products like ah, Manzanita is our
favorite. And we'll go down to southeastern
Arizona and collect that in the winter time and
then bring it back up and finish it here. It's been
very popular.
>>Located just minutes from the scenic ferry landing
at Kootenay Bay on the east shore of BC's
magnificent Kootenay Lake is the small community
of Crawford Bay. it's the home of North
Woven Broom as well as a hand-full of businesses
featuring skilled artisans at work, which along with
the lake, help make Crawford Bay
an attractive place to visit.
(Rob) That's what makes I think Crawford Bay
such an interesting place, is that there are so many
places where you can go and see somebody
actually doing their craft, and you know,
like being able to see it, in the process.
This area is quite well known to European tourists, and so
we get a lot of German, a lot of ah Dutch, a lot of
ah Swiss, a lot of English people coming.
>>Regardless of where they're from, it's easy
for first timers to north woven broom to be swept up
and dazzled by the sheer volume and wide assortment
of broom styles that are available to choose from.
(Rob) Almost every style we make is quite popular.
But the Shaker Flat, the flat broom is definitely
the most popular. So, we sell a lot of cobwebbiers,
which are strictly made to reach over your head.
We have a huge assortment of different types of
fireplace brooms. We have whisk brooms and, in fact,
sometimes interesting custom brooms. One of the
things that people always are interested in is the
fact that we, made brooms for the publishers of the
Harry Potter books. Over the years ah, we've made
about 300 brooms for them. Plus we've made a lot of
movie brooms as well.
>>Along with their impressive inventory
Rob and Janet's broom company also offers
live demonstrations designed to give visitors
a first hand look at how some of the
sweeping beauties surround them are made. In this
case it's the popular, wooden dowel, shaker flat broom
that takes center stage.
(Janet Schwieger) At this electric winder I use wire on
the inside so what I'm going to do is add the inside layer I'm
just going to pound it a little bit and shape it.
And that's the end of the inside layer.
So in doing the outside layer I transfer to the cord.
Now in this cast I'm using the soaked broom corn.
It's the same quality brush but just better quality stems.
So now this is about the last time you will ever see that
inside layer. It's going to be tucked away for good.
All that has to go down to the broom handle...
Now this is the pretty part and the
part everyone likes to see which is the weave.
And really it's an over under weave.
I will do this a little slower then I might
just so you can see what I'm doing.
Now once it's made it needs to be flattened,
three lined, trimmed off, put a leather on it,
hang it to dry for five days, make sure it's
all trimmed up nice and then we put it out for sale.
>>With Janet's show and tell complete and
another hand crafted sweeper ready for sale,
its safe to say anyone who enters North Woven Broom
is bound to exit with a greater appreciation for a
simple tool we often take for granted.
Ultimately, that's important to rob and Janet Schwieger, who
from the very beginning saw broom making not only
as an opportunity to earn a living but a chance to
earn a little respect for the not so ordinary broom.
(Rob) People comment on it quite often you just don't
see this kind of thing anymore. And it does feel good
that we are doing something that allows people to see
how things were created in the past.