Anita Burrows

How to make hand made paper in your kitchen

By Anita J Burrows

Anita is available for paper making workshops please contact Anita by:e-mail nitaburrows@hotmail.comTel 07762702806

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Anita Burrows

How to make hand-made paper

You can make hand-made paper in your kitchen with just a few basic tools and a sink with draining board. Making paper is a very watery procedure so having absorbent cloths, newspaper or towels at hand is always useful.

First of all you need to source some paper to pulp. This can be old envelopes, shredded computer paper, basically anything that isn't glossy with lots of printed pictures; as this would be too acidic.

To recycle paper it needs to be in shreds or torn into squares about the size of a large postage stamp.

Paper linters (these are sheets of processed material) which you can soak and shred to make paper.As you can see they can be made from various raw materials.They are available from art and craft shops.

The paper shreds/squares are then soaked in water for at least 24 hours. This is so the fibres will break down into soft manageable pieces which can then be placed in a kitchen blender, food processor or stick blender. The paper is pulped until it resembles soft clumps of broken fibre.

The soaking process can be speeded up by using chemicals such as bleach or caustic soda but obviously more care is need when handling this material and the paper pulp require thorough washing before it is used. If you use chemicals please be aware you must wear rubber gloves.

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Anita Burrows

The processed paper pulp is then placed in large vat with more water, the ratio is not an exact science and trial and error will inform how you work, depending how thick you require your paper to be.At this stage you can add a desert spoonful of PVA as a size, this helps to seal the paper if you wish to use it for writing paper.

You can now add found ingredients to your pulp, this is where the fun starts, don't be afraid to experiment. As you can see petals can be added, tea, spices, plant material and confetti.If one adds plant material it is sometimes better to cook the material first in a pan or pressure cooker in order to break down the fibres.

You are now ready to couch your first piece of paper and you will need a deckle and frame. I have made my own with wood and stretched net curtaining, two embroidery hoops can be used or even old picture frames.

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Always stir the pulp mixture well before each couching. This makes sure that the pulp is evenly dispersed.

Couching a piece of paper, here you can see how you place the frame on top of the deckle and using a movement where you take the bottom edge of the frame into the pulp first. Push the frame and deckle to the bottom of the vat and take it horizontally across the bottom of the vat. This avoids air bubbles forming. Lift the frame and deckle from the pulp and allow to drain.

Remove the frame from the deckle and couch your sheet of paper onto a damp J cloth. The deckle must be turned over in a confident sweep pushing the deckle into the J cloth. A damp sponge can be used over the mesh to press the pulp onto the cloth.

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Lift the deckle off the J cloth and cover with another damp J cloth. You are now building a pile of sheets, known as a post.

At this stage you can also add petals, threads and other found objects such as lace. You must cover the material with small amounts of pulp or sandwich them inside two sheets of paper, thus laminating or duplexing your sheet of paper.

When you have produced a post of around 8 sheets, you will need to press your paper. Here you can see the press I have made using a car jack. A simpler way is to use two boards slightly larger than your sheets of paper and placing your J cloths and paper between them, squeeze the moisture out by clamping the boards with G clamps or screw clamps. You will need to place the boards on the draining board as quite a bit of water will drip out.

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Anita Burrows

Once the paper has been pressed it can be hung up to dry. The pulp will dry on the J cloth and once dry is easily peeled away. Stack your sheets of dried paper together and sandwiching between absorbent paper press again with heavy books or weights.

After a week or so your paper will be ready for creative use!

Good luck and I hope you enjoy making paper and experimenting.

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Anita Burrows

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