Paper Making at the Makers' Workshop

Today I had the experience of making water colour paper from cotton. You can technically do it yourself at home with a kit, here are the steps:

1. find a source of material, can be small cotton squares, old jeans, plant material

2. The Pulp- run the material through water and let the fibers deattach for 1.5 hrs

3. use a mold (netting) and deckle (paper size boarder) to pick up pulp and shake evenly until pulp has bonded

4. place on to felt to soak up water

5. press pulp to flaten into paper and take out water

6. pick up and let dry by hanging on metal or window wall

7. use a paint roller to release air bubbles and flaten one side

8. let dry for 24 hrs

Our tour guide gets his material from local places: a local hotel that has left over material from linens, jeans from Salvation Army, apples from orchards in Tas, and even wallaby and wombat POOP from parks. He can chose the thickness of the paper by diluting the pulp and adding more water. The one we made was thick and could be used for painting with water colours. The Makers' Workshop also had other art and craft makers working like a mold and deckle maker, paper folder, weaver, painter, a miniaturist and more.