Papermaking
at Home and in the Classroom - Equipment and Supplies
The technique used in this cookbook makes use of common materials and
requires at most a little woodworking to create beautiful handmade paper.
Materials
Scrap paper from junk mail, catalogs, or magazines, torn into small
pieces (you'll need about one large sheet of scrap for each sheet of paper
you're going to make). Avoid using newsprint; when it's beaten it turns into
a gray mush and produces an unattractive sheet of low-quality paper that has
already been recycled. Also newsprint isn't acid-free, so paper made from it
yellows and gets brittle.
- A food blender (often available in thrift stores).
- A mold (a frame to which a fine mesh screen has been attached).
- A deckle (a frame that mates with the one used for the mold, but which
has no screen).
- A vat (a large plastic container that holds the slurry picked up by
the mold and deckle).
- Liquid starch (optional, for sizing).
- Kitchen whisk
- Pieces of wool blanket, about twenty, each cut a bit larger than the
sheet size.
- Spray bottle (to hold water for misting the surfaces of the wool
blankets).
- A large sponge
- Two plastic or waterproofed plywood boards (for pressing formed
sheets).
- Pieces of cloth (bed sheeting works well) cut to size for ironing the
formed sheets dry.
- An iron.
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