kozo

Last night in my paper making class we were working with Kozo fibers. This particular Kozo came from a mulberry bush in Korea. The fibers you see floating in the pot with water have been cooked and are the layer of fiber just below the bark, called the pith. Most eastern papers are traditionally hand beaten. You take the long strands out of the water, remove any stray chunks of bark, and beat them with a mallet on a hard surface. This took a while because the fibers have to be beaten enough so the evenly disperse on a screen.

Pictured above are the beaten Kozo fibers suspended in water and a small screen. Traditionally the screens are made of woven bamboo and mounted onto a wooden frame, but we were using wire mesh. Eastern papers also don't use a deckle mold.

Once the screen was passed through the water several times collecting fiber, we pressed it onto a piece of taut fabric stretched over a large wooden frame. A sponge was pressed gently onto it from the back, to transfer the surface tension from the screen to the fabric. When the screen was pulled away, the paper was stuck to the fabric. When it is dry it will be peeled off.