by Suzanne Daub
Greg and Judi Hill of Hill’s of Nantucket are offering a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to own the tools used to create thousands of exquisite lightship baskets—approximately 70 handcrafted Nantucket lightship basket molds by the late Master Basketmaker Paul Willer.
Paul Willer, who crossed the bar in 2025 at the age of 95, was not simply a weaver of Nantucket lightship baskets: he was a maker. The distinction matters enormously. Over the course of a career spanning more than five decades, he hand-crafted every component of his baskets from scratch: the molds, the staves, the rims, the knobs, even the bone carvings that adorned them. He is credited with producing more than 2,000 lightship baskets, nearly all of his own original design. He is celebrated for a string of innovative “firsts” in the tradition: the first square lightship basket, the first ice bucket basket, the first bud vase basket, a Bic lighter basket,and the open salts that became beloved collector pieces. Now, the tools of that extraordinary creative life—approximately 70 of Willer’s handmade molds—are being offered for sale by Greg and Judi Hill of Hill’s of Nantucket on Straight Wharf. For serious collectors of Nantucket craft, this is a rare and perhaps unrepeatable opportunity.
Paul and his partner Peter Guarino arrived on Nantucket in 1969 (Paul fell in love with the island as the ferry came into the harbor), and a few years later, in 1971, they purchased and renovated an Orange Street property, transforming it into The House of Orange, a beloved seven-room inn that became a fixture of island life for three decades.
Greg and Judi Hill first met Willer in 1976 in Hawaii. Judi was among the first to sell Paul’s baskets during his early days, and the friendship deepened over the years. When Paul and Peter decided to close The House of Orange in 2004, they began clearing out its contents. It was then that Judi and Greg turned to Paul with a straightforward question: what are you going to do with all your basket materials?
“I don’t know,” Paul replied. “Maybe I’ll just take it to the dump.”
Judi wasn’t sure whether he was joking. “This was his life’s work of creativity,” she recalls. The Hills didn’t hesitate: they offered to buy it all. “Basketmakers don’t make all these components from scratch anymore,” she said. They knew what was at stake.
That distinction between a weaver and a maker is at the heart of what makes Paul Willer’s molds significant. Today, most lightship basket weavers purchase their tops, bottoms, and rims pre-made, and even molds can be commercially sourced. Paul Willer did none of that. Inspired in the early 1970s by basket expert Edgar Seeler who gave him his very first mold, Paul went on to design and handbuild every mold he ever used. They are his art. Others copied his designs over the years, but Paul’s molds are the original.
“Paul was a basketmaker, not a weaver. He created his baskets from scratch — and that makes such a difference.”
Willer’s basement workshop at 25 Orange Street was where all of this happened. Patiently working with a band saw, boiling green oak staves to make them pliable, and steaming the long rims using a pipe rigged to a teakettle, he produced baskets of remarkable consistency and refinement. His lightship baskets are tightly woven with flat oak staves, finished with orange shellac, and built with rims that are not nailed—details that set them apart immediately to anyone who knows the form. The market for Paul Willer’s Nantucket lightship baskets has always been competitive. Gail Osona of Rafael Osona Auctions once noted “Our collectors absolutely love his work. When we have them, they are highly coveted—they fight over them.” The molds that produced those baskets carry their own compelling argument for collectors: they are the origin point, the creative intelligence behind everything that came after.
The collection Judi Hill is now offering spans the full sweep of Paul’s creative range. There are approximately 70 molds in all, from a mold the size of a coffee table to the tiny forms he used to weave necklace baskets. Paul was renowned for his miniatures, including earring baskets the size of pencil erasers and nested sets small enough to wear. Among the molds are forms for many of his pioneering designs, including the square basket, the ice bucket, and the bud vase.
The molds themselves are objects of beauty. Made from different hardwoods, they carry the warm patina that comes from years of use in a working studio. The varied colors of the wood, the subtle marks of the hand-tool process, the wear of decades—all of it is part of their appeal. “They are like works of art,”Judi commented.
Some of the molds are in working condition, and a skilled basketmaker could put them to use today. Others may be better suited for display, a middle ground between tool and artifact.
“I wanted to preserve the tradition,” Judi says of the decision she and Greg made more than twenty years ago when they stepped in to save Paul’s materials from an uncertain fate. “I think Paul would be happy if he knew I could sell his work…what he used for his craft.”
Paul Willer’s ingenuity and dedication to the lightship basket tradition earned him a place among the great names in a Nantucket craft being celebrated this week at the Nantucket Historical Association’s annual Baskets, Bubbles & Bourbon event. His molds are a direct line to that legacy: functional, beautiful, historically significant, and one-of-a-kind.
Prospective buyers are encouraged to call or email Hill’s of Nantucket at 40 Straight Wharf, Nantucket. Some of the molds may also be viewed in the gallery. Given the significance of the collection and the depth of interest collectors have historically shown in Paul Willer’s work, early inquiry is suggested. Hill’s of Nantucket is located at 40 Straight Wharf
