Making Handmade Grass Paper
I remember exactly where I was on November 3, 2020. Making grass paper. I was stressed about the presidential election, so I figured why not give this strange paper idea a try, while keep my mind from pondering the day’s events? What’s the worst that could happen?
Turns out, grass paper was a great idea. I had tried using botanicals in my handmade paper before, but not like this, and I’m so happy I gave it a shot.
Using grass in handmade paper is definitely an odd choice, I will admit. But one day when I visited my dad’s, he was just finishing up bagging the grass clippings from the freshly mowed lawn. The organic bin was filled with grass clippings and a variety of the fallen leaves. I knew I had to give making paper out of this grass a try, at least. If it failed miserably, so be it! But if it worked, how cool?!
The grass become a neon-y green color in the blender, but the final sheets dried much lighter.
So I gathered up a handful of the clippings and saved them for the weekend, when I knew I would have time to use them before they started to decompose.
The process of making this paper is similar to how you make normal recycled handmade paper. You blend up all of the fibers, including the grass, fill a vat with water, paper pulp, and the grass (of course), then start pulling sheets. I processed all the pulp the day before I was planning on making sheets, in the hopes I’d save some time on the day of. But the next day when I went to start pulling sheets, man oh man did that pulp smell! There was a very organic aroma throughout the whole process, and unfortunately for me it was quite unpleasant. So lesson learned: If I was going to do this again, I’d need to do everything in one day to avoid such an unpleasant odor.
The grass clippings also ended up being tougher to blend than I thought (though I’m not sure if this is a reflection of my subpar, second-hand blender or the toughness of the grass). But overall, as I started pulling sheets, I was surprised at how well they were looking coming out of the vat! Many of the individual blades of grass showed through in the final sheet, as you’ll see, which I loved. It’s always such a great feeling when you succeed at something totally experimental for the first time.
With all the sheets formed, dried, and pressed, then it was really just a waiting game. I was hesitant to use these papers in any of my projects right away as I had no idea how the grass clippings would age over time. Just because they were embedded in a piece of paper didn’t guarantee they’d keep.
It was November 2020 when I made this batch; five months later in April 2021, the sheets are still looking great. I’m sure there’s some science behind why the grass clippings haven’t decomposed, but for now I’ll just accept it as fact. I’m excited to finally be using these sheets in some upcoming book projects, which will be posted to the shop in the coming weeks.
What do you think about this handmade grass paper? Cool or meh? Drop a comment below, or send me a message!
