Making Handmade Paper
Monday, June 14, 2010 at 01:42PM Though making paper is a bit of an art and takes a full day of being crafty, seeing all your beautiful sheets of paper lined up to dry makes it well worth the effort! Handmade paper is just so special – and if you read our last post you’ll know why we’re making this batch! This weekend has been gorgeously sunny and calm - a perfect weekend for paper making, as it helps the sheets dry quickly.
The process started by ripping 60 sheets of green used A4 office paper into little pieces, soaking the pieces in hot water for an hour and then adding them slowly to an old blender...
Blending the paper into a pulp, adding scoops of the pulp to a large container of water, giving the mix a swish and then creating a sheet by dipping in a frame and screen...
Gently transferring the paper to a drying card...
Peeling the paper off the cards once dry and admiring the final product of 58 sheets of beautiful 100% recycled A3 paper!
I was lucky enough to be able to borrow two simple paper making kits from friends (thanks Kel and Alex!), which have the frame you need to make paper. You sometimes see these kits at op shops, garage sales or e-bay. You can also make your own frames. If you’re keen to make paper at home, libraries often have helpful ‘how to’ books, or a quick Google search will give you lots of ideas!
Reader Comments (7)
Gorgeous, clever and resourceful... can't wait to see them made into invitations!
That looks just like the paper I made for my wedding invitations - only I didn't have green office paper so I used newspaper and food colouring and I stuck eucalyptus leaves on them. To stay with the native theme, my mother in law made me a bouquet of eucalyptus leaves, flannel flowers and blushing bride proteas. I imagine your wedding will be wonderful.
looks great - a summer task perhaps? I think my boy would love doing it. Must remember it next summer...
They look great. This would be an awesome summer school holidays activity for my girls!
Wonderful to see your enthusiasm for paper making and thanks for the compliments on the paper Dixibelle, Telela, Umatji and Darren :-) Good luck with your own paper making adventures - it's a really fun craft activity!
Inspirational post for me. I have paper on my list of things I want to make myself and this simple post has just got me thinking that I can do that. I am going to borrow some books from the local library and start. Thanks, Wendy
Wonderful to hear you are inspired to make your own paper Wendy! Good luck!