EVER wondered how to make handcrafted paper, the kind used for decorative notes? If so, you should visit a small factory in the mountain town of Nantou, Taiwan, where locals have been pounding out handmade paper since time immemorial.
The process of making paper begins with carefully choosing the fibers that will eventually determine the quality of the paper. The fibers that are commonly used include bark, hemp, rattan, rice straw, wheat, bamboo and even sugarcane.
How to Make Paper:
1. Get Some Pulp
After choosing the type of plant material from which to make the paper it’s time to begin the most labor-intensive part of the process: Add water and begin beating the plant matter to a pulp, literally. Eventually, the water and plant fibers will turn into a material that resembles paste. This process I vital to the qualities of the end product. For example, the longer the paste is beaten, the more translucent the paper becomes. This pulping process also determines other qualities, such as flexibility and printability.
2. Mold the Pulp
Wooden, ribbed frames are then dipped into vats o this pulp. The key here is to create thin sheets of the pulp and to begin the process of removing the water. This process involves a lot of shaking. The frames are shaken (back-to-front, side-to-side) by hand to even out the layers of pulp. This movement also helps to interlock the tiny fibers to strengthen the paper and to create an even mat.
3. Squeeze Out the Water
The third step of the process is to simultaneously begin drying out the pulp while keeping its paper-like form. This process involves pressing the sheets of paste under cubic tons of weight. In the old days this would be done with rocks. Today even handcrafted paper uses a little help form modern hydraulics to maximize the pressure applied. This process squeezes out the water and, in order to speed up the process, tiny threads are placed between each sheet so that they can be separated later.
4. Drying the Paper
Even under tons of pressure, these sheets of pulp need further dehydration to cement the fibers in their place. The paper is then ironed with equipment similar to what your neighborhood dry cleaner uses to press your clothes. Once dried the paper is ready to be collected into deliverable lots.
All four stages can be done without the help of machinery, but it is a long and arduous process. The paper ends up in boutiques and specialty gift shops throughout the world.
