The indigenous peoples of the North live in taiga and lead a semi-settled lifestyle. Their way of life is defined by their need and potential to engage in hunting and fishing. The need for seasonal migrations imposes certain rules on how they go about their day-to-day tasks. In a certain way, summer and winter camps are islands of stability — they are filled with objects that people usually associate with these seasons.
Containers such as boxes, birch bark vessels, and kuzov bags play an important role in organizing the household. They are used for storing useful things such as tools, clothes, dishes, and food. These containers can also be used for professional purposes.
Such storage solutions include baskets, boxes, and fir bark jewelry boxes. Boxes made of fir come in round or oval shapes and various sizes. Only the walls are made of fir bark, the bottom and the lid are made of birch bark. Round boxes have flat lids at the top. Oval boxes have lids with sidewalls.
In most cases, fir bark products feature decorative elements. The pattern on these boxes is linear, its outline is cut or drawn with a pencil and filled with paint. Traditionally, people used natural dyes for such purposes, which they extracted from birch and cherry. When it comes to birch, the dye is contained in the leaves, bark of young trees and chaga mushrooms. Bird cherry dye is extracted from its bark. Such dyes are collected in early summer. The hue of the dye varies from light yellow to dark brown. Since the middle of the 20th century, watercolors have been used increasingly more often.
Handicraft items and children’s toys are stored in short boxes. Clothes can also be stored in tall and large boxes. Raw materials (tree bark) for making boxes are harvested in mid-May, before fir sap begins to rise, or in early June, when it stops. The flow of sap gives the bark a reddish hue, and the tree is to be considered alive at this time, so harvesting materials from it is deemed unacceptable. Fir bark is believed to possess magical cleansing properties, it is an indispensable attribute of ritual incense burning.
