How to Identify Longaberger Baskets

Longaberger baskets are handcrafted baskets made with strict attention to quality and detail. The Longaberger Company has been creating beautiful baskets and other home furnishing crafts for 35 years. Due to the high quality of Longaberger baskets, they tend to be expensive. Often as you are browsing through thrift shops or auction sales, you might find baskets that look as if they might be Longaberger baskets. If you know how to identify Longaberger baskets, you can snag a deal or avoid a cheap impostor basket.

Hold the basket in your hands and get a feel for how heavy it is. Longaberger baskets are always made with hard maple wood and they will feel solid and heavy in your hands. A cheaper basket will feel lighter than a Longaberger basket.

Look at the bottom of the basket to find a date, the weaver’s initials and the Longaberger Company logo stamped on the outside bottom surface. If you see the Longaberger Company logo marked or crossed out, this likely means the basket is a “second” and there were flaws that prevented it from fetching full price. These baskets are not worth more money than “firsts.”

Check the trim strip around the top of the basket to see how it attaches to the basket. If the basket is a Longaberger basket, you will find small tacks securing the trim strip to the basket. If the basket is not old and the trim strip has staples, it is not a Longaberger basket.

Find the splints that run vertically up and down the sides of the basket. You should find tightly woven wood surrounding the splints. Often lesser quality baskets do not have the same tightly woven wood that Longaberger baskets do.