Paper from Cloth

Course: Papermaking for Textile Designers Tutor : Jonathan Korejko

This new papermaking course was launched on the weekend of 23 -25 November 2012 at Higham Hall College in the Lake District. It was all about rags ! I prepared a variety of pulps in my studio for the students to use in the making of their cloth based papers. This included the recycling of bed sheets, a bath towel, redundant blue jeans, and linen from a mill in Northern Ireland. The students enhanced these base pulps by chopping up a variety of coloured cotton threads, jute twine, silk, and cotton cloth to produce an enormous array of different colours and textures. Many of the pieces produced included complete bits of cloth and thread, too. The resultant papers went far beyond the ordinary, becoming works of art which combined liquid cloth with solid textiles. Some of the paper was finished in its own right, others will be worked on by the students at home as they use their rag papers for embroidery, construction and bookbinding projects.

Colourful cotton threads made many different hues of paper.

J.Korejko 2013

T: 01526 378222

E: jj.ck@zen.co.uk

W: www.timberlandand.co.uk

page 1 of 7

Various cotton embroidery threads were liquidised in a blender, turning the material into raw fibre. The white cotton base pulp was prepared in a Hollander beater. When mixed together, these fibres made tints of red, blue, yellow, green and orange liquid cloth". We also prepared threads to decorate our denim pulp, and added linen thread into the linen papers.

J.Korejko 2013

T: 01526 378222

E: jj.ck@zen.co.uk

W: www.timberlandand.co.uk

page 2 of 7

Denim pulp was used to embed strips of purple cotton twill which was criss-crossed on the wet base layer.

The purple strips were captured by the top layer of denim, pressed, and dried.
J.Korejko 2013 T: 01526 378222 E: jj.ck@zen.co.uk W: www.timberlandand.co.uk page 3 of 7

Couch... embed...

...release thread.

Gradually building a piece of paper using liquid cloth to capture...

J.Korejko 2013 T: 01526 378222 E: jj.ck@zen.co.uk

thread and material, to make a new piece of textile.

W: www.timberlandand.co.uk

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Denim pulp, embedded strips of silk, crossed with cotton thread. The cloth based paper begins to turn into a hybrid piece of fabric.

J.Korejko 2013

T: 01526 378222

E: jj.ck@zen.co.uk

W: www.timberlandand.co.uk

page 5 of 7

People who were involved in other courses during the weekend at Higham Hall visited us in the studio on Sunday morning. Its very rewarding as a tutor to watch a student confidently talk to visitors about the various processes which they have recently learned.

J.Korejko 2013

T: 01526 378222

E: jj.ck@zen.co.uk

W: www.timberlandand.co.uk

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C L O T H

P A P E R

T H

E
N T W I N E D

R
E A D

J.Korejko 2013

T: 01526 378222

E: jj.ck@zen.co.uk

W: www.timberlandand.co.uk

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