Colorful Cotton Paper

It was great to finally get into the papermaking studio and make a few batches of paper this week. Here is a synopsis.

In early spring I used some RIT dye I had purchased at a tag sale to transform estate sale white cotton sheets into an array of colorful cloth.

Not having the time to turn all of this fabric into pulp, I chose the bottom batch (labeled scarlet but turned out to be more of salmon) and another white sheet to turn into pulp.

First I made ten sheets of salmon colored paper and embedded a piece of fabric into each one. The fabric was originally the trim design on a cotton sheet I got from my grandmother's linen closet. These sheets will serve as covers to journals.

Next I made white paper for the pages. Then I mixed the two pulps to create a range of pinks. Some of the pink reminded me of cotton candy. (Look at that deckle edge!)

Lastly I added some yellow pulp I had on hand to shift the color to a peach.

Papermaking with Kids - Great Sesame Street Video

I came across this video this morning. It is so much fun! Looks like it was filmed at Dieu Donne in New York City. I think one of the instructors is Helen Hiebert. It is wonderful to see the kids making paper a) the real, messy, wet way and b) from old cotton clothing. Enjoy!

Papermaking Services

Do you save favorite old shirts, jeans, sheets and the like because you love the color? Do you have a collection of vintage tablecloths but don't use them because they have stains or don't match your decor? Let me turn your cherished cotton and/or linen fabrics into one of kind paper that you can use in a variety of ways. Use this paper to back special photos in a frame or scrapbook, as stationery, to cover boxes to store memorabilia, in artwork. The uses are limited only to your imagination.

Paper can be made into 4x6, 5x7, 8.5x11, 9x12 and 11x17 size sheets. A half pound of fabric yields approximately 25 8.5x11 size sheets.

Requirements: a) fabric must be cotton or linen or a blend of the two
                        b) a minimum of a half pound of fabric is required
 
If you are interested or have questions, please email me at susanernst1@gmail.com.

This paper is made from a yellow cotton tablecloth which belonged to my grandmother. It was lovingly used and contained several gravy stains. I have used many of these papers in my artwork.

An Attitude of Gratitude Journal - Strengths

Continuing along with the month long Attitude of Gratitude Journal challenge, here is Day 9:

Today's theme is strengths. Questions to answer are:
What do other people think are your strengths?
Do you agree with them?
Which of your strengths are you most thankful for?

The technique challenge is to incorporate fabric on the journal page.

This page was created by writing on a sheet of my handmade marigold dyed cotton paper to which I had embedded, at the sheet-forming stage, three pieces of eco-bundled fabric. I attached it to the journal page with double sided tape.

New Paper

I've taken a break from natural dye experiments to make some paper. The results of my labors of Wednesday and Thursday:

I like the way the colors from an eco-bundling experiment coordinate with the colors of the paper.

2012 Papermaking Season Has Begun

It was a beautiful, sunny day today and I was off from work, so spent some time outside straightening up my papermaking studio and setting some fibers to ret.  Mulberry, willow, kozo and gampi bast fibers were each put in a five gallon bucket with approximately six ounces of wood ash and four gallons of water. I put tightly fitting lids on them and placed them in the sun. I plan to give them a stir or tumble once a week for a month. Hopefully April will be warm and sunny so that I can cook these fibers and then beat them. Then the real fun begins!

Mulberry bast with bark

willow bast with bark

gampi

kozo

The mulberry and willow basts were gathered here on our property.  I bought the beautifully clean gampi from Keith Gum of IFUGAO Papercraft. The kozo is from Magnolia Paper.

 I am also reading up on preparing fibers for natural dyeing.  My plan is to dye the cotton sheets first this year, then cut and beat them. This should be easier than trying to mordant, rinse, dye and rinse pulp like I did last summer. From what I read, I believe I need to treat the fabric with tannin (need to find a natural source of that), then mordant twice with alum. Fibers/fabrics can be premordanted and kept indefinitely, ready and available when the dye materials present themselves! I am also planning to use this dyed cotton fabric for weaving and small sewn projects.

2011 Papers

A sampling of the papers I made this summer

Some of the papers you see here are (bottom to top):
14x17 - kozo dyed with forest green Procion dye, Philippine gampi, sage dyed under-beaten cotton, flax, goldenrod dyed cotton
8.5x11 left -  pure cotton rag, cabbage dyed cotton, carrot top dyed cotton, bamboo sheaths, turmeric dyed cotton and abaca
5x7 left recycled paper
8.5x11 right- gampi dyed with colored tissue during pressing of sheets, gampi, purple-leaf plum bark dyed gampi, abaca dyed with dandelion leaves and flowers; sage dyed cotton, goldenrod dyed cotton, carrot top with copper modifier dyed cotton, flax

Garden Sage Dyed Cotton Pulp

I read in the book Eco Colour: Botanical Dyes for Beautiful Textiles by India Flint that the leaves of garden sage make a red dye. This intrigued me and since I have several very robust Salvia officinalis plants, I decided to try it. I believe this must be a misprint. It is more than likely that the purple flowers will yield a red dye. I will try that next June. In the meantime I am very pleased with the sage green I got from these leaves.

leaves before cooking dyed pulp before & after rinsing

the dried, finished sheets

I simmered some of the used dye bath until it was reduced to half. The color is very dark. I believe this will make a wonderful ink.

Carrot Tops and Goldenrod

Tools

August 24, 2011 - After spending a few days beating cut up cotton sheets in my Mark Lander Beater, I began the process of dyeing this pulp with plant materials easily accessible to me. The carrot tops I got from carrots I bought at the farmers' market and the goldenrod is growing wild in my backyard.

L to R: cotton pulp after mordanting; carrot tops dye bath; unrinsed cotton pulp

dyed with carrot tops, rinsed pulp with lots of the color removed.

L to R: goldenrod before & after simmering; dye bath

Papermaking Summer 2009

Spent as much time as I could between the other happenings to make paper this summer. I wanted to use pulps I had cooked and frozen over the past few years, but I also really wanted to try beating linen and cotton cloth in my Lander beater. I made one batch of beaten linen from 4 old linen tea towels. I also made pulp from a yellow cotton tablecloth. After speaking with someone at Carriage House Paper in Brooklyn, NY I decided to beat some abaca to ad to the cotton pulp to make a stronger paper for printmaking. So I had 3 pounds of pulp and other pulp that I had taken out of the freezer to use up.

It was great! Last year Bob added two windows to our old potting/tool shed and installed electricity so that I could use it as my papermaking studio. It was a great way to make the best of the hot, humid days we had in early August. Keeping my hands in the cool water helped a lot to keep me refreshed. Plus I love the meditative process of papermaking. I love that I have a flow. It took a few years to master my moves and now it comes so naturally.

Here are some videos and photos taken during the course of the summer:

This video is the beating of a yellow cotton tablecloth:





The finished pulp - ready to use!










cotton and abaca sheets of paper.






















This is the linen towels being beaten. You can see the fibers starting to separate.

Here is a condensed version of pulling sheets of gampi fiber. I used formation aid which slowed down the draining process, so cut all that footage out.





My homemade paper press in action.