Handmade Paper Exchange

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Creating and experimenting with handmade paper has quickly become one of my favorite projects to do – I love the seemingly endless possibilities and ideas to explore!

Twin Cities Paper Making Community

I’ve been lucky to learn all sorts of techniques from my good friend here in the Twin Cities, Sophia. She is a powerhouse of creative skills and is the maker and artist behind Flaxen Press.

A blender is processing paper pulp in the basement studio of Flaxen Press run by Sophia Hotzler. Her arm is shown holding the blender and shows her camera tattoo on her forearm

You’ll definitely see more about her in upcoming posts as we spend more time together in each other’s studios! Here’s a shot taken from my first visit to the Flaxen Press studio – I love how her love for photography and papermaking come together in this photo!

Handmade Paper Exchange

Through Sophia, I heard about the Handmade Paper Exchange that’s put together by Genevieve Lapp and I’m so excited to participate!

Paper artists submit 11 sheets of their handmade paper and receive 10 random sheets from other artists who participated. I was so inspired while looking through the submissions from last year that Sophia showed me! It’s always so fun to see what other people come up with in their creative process.

Here is a peek at the sheets of handmade paper I received – I love the variations in colors and textures! If you want to take a look at the sheets I received, there’s a Part 2 to this blog, here.

You can see more submissions from this year and past exchanges on Instagram!

A close up shot of 10 handmade sheets of paper from the paper exchange with various colors and textures. Some colors seen include a bright pink, white, grey, and one with blue features. The top sheet has imprinted textures of botanical leaves.

My Submission – Carnation Paper

For my submission, I’ve created a handcrafted paper from recycled paper waste and the petals from two bouquets of Carnations.

The base is made from recycled paper and petals from a coral colored bouquet of Carnations. I decorated the sheet with the dried petals of a multi-colored bouquet. As they, dried they all came to a deep purple pigment.

Once the petals were dried, I crushed them over the pulp in the mould and deckle while it was still wet so it dried into the page.

In this case, I had boiled the petals for about 3 minutes to blanch them to keep the pigments from running – which didn’t work – but I really loved the effect that the color bleeding gave!

My mistake may have lied in the fact that I didn’t do an ice bath after boiling – But at this point I’m really happy with how it turned out anyway! When I look at it, I get the sense of motion through space. The petals look like meteors or motion-blurred stars passing by. Keep reading to see the finished product!

My Process

Let’s get into the details! Here’s how I made this paper in my home studio:

Two bouquets of carnation flowers held in hand. One is all coral colored and the second set is multi colored

First, I picked up 2 bouquets of Carnations from Costco. I chose a set of flowers with one color to add to the base of the paper. The second was a multi-colored bouquet that I used for the decoration.

Next, I cut off all of the blooms so they were easier to handle. They looked so cute in the bowl, I had to take a picture!

Multi colored carnation flower heads arranged in a stainless steel bowl set on a wooden table

Coral Colored Carnation Flower Petals in a stainless steel bowl on a wooden table

I then separated the petals into two separate bowls to prepare them for blanching. One bowl had just the coral petals, and the second held the other colors.

I boiled them for 3 minutes while stirring, and then took them out to cool. Here is a guide on blanching – I’m more of a vibes-based person so I glanced at the instructions and ran with the general idea which produced a cool result so I’m documenting how I got this, but it’s ultimately not how it’s done if I’m being honest!

Multi colored carnation flower petals in a stainless steel bowl. the petals are pink, purple, red, and white

Paper pulp in a mould and deckel. The pulp is wet and has deep purple dried flower petals crushed over it for decoration.

I blended the coral petals with recycled paper to create the base for this paper. Then I took the dried multi colored petals and crushed them over the pulp while it was still wet.

After this, I left the pulp in my Worown mould frames* on a shelf to dry with a fan pointed at them. The result is this beautiful pigment streaking effect and I love the texture!

a photo taken of a finished sheet of carnation paper. It is on a wooden table with sunlight illuminating the paper and its texture. The base of the paper is white with deep purple flower petals dried into it. the pigment from the petals has floated and created the effect of streaks from the petals. it gives a sense of motion, almost like a meteor shower

*At no cost to you, I may receive a commission through this link