Canvas We offer 10.10-oz. "Sunforger" treated (water repellent, mildew-inhibiting & flame-resistant) natural cotton canvas. It offers the best, longest-lasting potential, is easy to maintain, and is lightweight for greater portability.
Thread All of our tipi patterns are sewn with heavy, size 92, nylon or dacron thread--the best for UV protection.
Lacing Pins We now use hardwood dowel for pins. Beautiful and traditional red dogwood lacing pins we make ourselves are also available.
Pegs or Stakes Made of pine, whittled to a point, and of perfect size and style for our strong loops. We now carry hand-forged iron tent stakes from our friend Pawnee; the best for longevity.
Buttonholes we like to hand stitch with artificial sinew as they dry out easily and are very strong, durable, and long-lasting... and look great! However we have now perfected a nice machine-stitched buttonhole for a lesser price; still very long-lasting and with stylish Western design.
Bottom Loops are available in either our original high strength webbing patches--or "period authentic" musketballs and cotton string as loops (with our own extra reinforcement to keep the balls from popping out under stress.)
Other: High strength tubular dacron webbing or strong nylon webbing is used at the tip. Cotton, sisal, jute, or manila ropes are used; no artificial fibers. Tipis [with some exceptions] do not come with poles. Our tipis feature smoke flap pockets--not mere triangular patches. Smoke flaps are sewn with webbing for reinforcement. Reinforcement patches are placed at smoke flap connection and all stress points.
Everyone needs to experience the exaltation of tipi living. Somewhere in our over-modernized adult hearts resides that child's voice... that cries out with peals of joy upon entering these exquisite abodes!
We now make a teepee "a la carte": all a tipi's extra details are an option for you in your tipi kit--with combined shipping.
There are some things however that we insist on always doing: securing your indian tipi with a strong webbing at the tip and other crucial seams as well as triple layering the pin seam closure. We know how to make a tipi strong. There are other tipi makers who know how to build a tipi cheaply. With our tipis you see the stitching details--not faraway nostalgic photos! Check those other sites.
Tripod Clove Hitch
2) Hoist tripod
3) Set in poles and wrap rope around frame.
5) Hoist up tipi bundle
on lifting pole at back
7) Pin tipi (L over R)
Wow it's Tall Inside...
Smoke Flap Pocket
Peg Loop
4) Tie tipi bundle to lifting pole
Wall Tents____________________
We use the same treated "Sunforger" 10-oz. canvas and high strength thread. The poles are lodgepole with steel spikes; also steel tent stakes, and cotton rope.
Period authentic, no mosquito net... but has a completely sealed floor unlike some other wall tents. Any size possible.
For small children's tipi a 10-ft. tipi is excellent.
A 14-ft. tipi is perfect for youngsters who want to really camp... or for a couple serious hunters who want the perfect nomadic shelter (this is the teepee setup early native americans most often used before horses... but be careful with a small fire.)
If you want a tipi which is very comfortable for two people, and still very transportable, you would be happy with a 16-ft. tipi. It's large enough for a fire.
18-foot tipis are roomy enough for two people to really share a life and are about the last easily transportable tipi.
20-foot tipis (barely small enough to transport with a large van) are roomy enough for a couple with two small children to grow endeared to one another (we did.)
For every couple of feet outward you can safely add another person to your clan... or else give the ones there a bit more room to grow. 22-feet would suit three children in a family (following that reasoning...) but using it in temporary situations eight people and their gear could easily fit in this size tipi.
Now into the realm of luxury, year-round, tipi living: consider a 24-foot tipi. Because of the high pitch of their walls nearly all of this floor space is usable. The possibilities are exciting to contemplate.
For the largest of pow-wows or for the most creative conferences, meetings, family reunions, business or corporate retreats, retail spaces--or just the grandest family home of all--a 30-foot tipi is for you.
We can sew any intermediate size--or larger!--please inquire.
Dogwood Tipi Pins in Bag
All written information, photos, layout, ad copy, and artwork on these pages--unless otherwise noted--is copyrighted in 2005 by Karl Heiss for exclusive use by the Straw Bale Trading Post. For permission to copy or reprint any of these created works in part or their entirety please contact the site administrator at yerbatrade@yahoo.com
(Should you ever have any problem with the stitching on your native american tipi during it's lifetime we will repair it for you free of charge.)
We still offer beautiful red dogwood lacing pins carved with design (photo at right), high-strength webbing reinforcements on the smoke flaps, strong bottom loops, (or musket balls with string!) rope sufficient for entire set-up, door, and iron or lodgepole stakes.
Our tipis are sewn in any tribal style desired: Sioux, Crow--even Kootenai! We enjoy the details which make a nomadic tipi authentic. [Tipis are Sioux tipi style unless otherwise specified.]
A tipi helped raise our daughter; she in turn learned to love and respect it's inspired design. Our old 19 ft. tipi is still in use on our property. It is sewn of our bison brown #10 15 oz. canvas and has weathered 7 summers and two winters in North Idaho.
Our standard selvage-edge stitched doorway and (rolled) trapezoidal Lakota door..
Set of Pins
1) Measure tripod poles and tie.
6) Pull cover around frame
8) Stake out bottom evenly... then move poles out to meet cover
9) A tipi ready to live in.
Visit
the Spokane House
at
Riverside State Park...
where one of our Trading Post tipis now has a home at the Spokane House interpretive center!
This beautiful location in the ponderosas is a historical site of a Hudson's Bay trading post (among other historical features.)
Directions: from I-90 in Spokane, Wa. take Exit 281 (Division St./Hwy.2) North to Francis Ave. (Highway 291) left (West)... and follow signs to various park features.
