The Beginnings Of Paper-Cloth

I love to stay up late and be creative. There's something about 2AM that really gets my juices flowing. Well, it's not quite 2AM, but I've been busy playing with making my own paper-cloth. I'm working through Kelly Perkins' book, Stitch Alchemy, with the yahoo group, mmartfriends. October 04 begins the official book study, but Belinda (the facilitator) has encouraged us to make the paper-cloth before the study begins so that we'll be ready to play with Perkins' techniques right away.

First, I got my supplies all together. To the left, there is a piece of freezer paper taped to my desk with a rectangle of plan, cheap, thin muslin laid out on it. On and around the laptop (my desk just isn't big enough!), there are piles of tissue papers, torn into strip and squares. There are also bits of book text, taken from Dickens' David Cooperfield. There is glue-water mixture in the frosting can in front of the computer. The glue is diluted at not quite a 1:2 ratio. On the computer screen, you see Pandora -- the only constant supply in my artistic arsenal.

Plain muslin with the diluted glue spread all over it. Doesn't look like much now, does it?

First layer of tissue paper pieces laid down on the muslin, with the glue-water patted into the tissue pieces. Then came the layer of book text pieces and another layer of decorative tissues. After each layer, I patted the diluted glue over the pieces that were being added. I also added squares of a beautiful, lacy, white Japanese rice paper. It looks as though it got lost in the layers. We shall see ...

I laid the plain white tissue paper over the entire cloth -- layering it and making sure the entire piece is covered. To keep from tearing the tissue when I glued it down, I spritzed it with a fine mist of water and then let that set for a minute or so. That seemed to help the tissue settle onto the page.

Now, it just has to dry overnight. I'm a bit concerned that my paper-cloth will be too thin to really be useful, since in some places there is only the final white tissue paper layer on top of the muslin. It was fun and easy, so I can make more tomorrow night, making whatever adjustments are necessary.