PaperMaking from Plants:

Lunaria/ MoneyPlant as Inclusion and Papers

A paper is achievable with Lunaria/Money Plant stems in soda ash with a blender.



These papers show a range of refinedness--- the rough sheet was poured--- the remnants of the small vat. The other two sheets were pulled, all were hydraulic pressed and air dried. Not a great paper, but if this were weed in my garden, as it is for the person who yanked mounds of these, I would definitely work with it. This pulp was blender processed. This would definitely be improved with beating -- as in blendering it. it broke up quickly and easily, but extensive blendering (3 minutes) continued to ... do that thing that blendering almost does but beating achieves....

........ I stuffed the whole plants in a pot, cooked them in soda ash until some of it seemed tender. I pulled out the "silver dollar" seed pods and their stems and some of the stalks that seemed the most tender.

There was a wide range of cooked-ness/doneness between both the various plants and the plant parts. So some stalks were done as were the stems and seed pods. I did not take out a lot, as I decided to continue cooking most of it with lye.

Lunaria/Money Plant seed pods and their accompanying stemlets make a better paper than the stalks, using soda ash cooking and blender processing.



They were hydraulic pressed, air dried and then jack pressed.



............................

I (re)cooked the stems in lye and then beat them. I added a bit of methylcellulose to the vat. They drained with a whoosh-'not a good sign,' I thought. The paper was a glorious ruddy gold while wet and dried to a blondy beige.

However-- it's a nice paper. Softer and not brush mat as its pulp behavior suggested it might be.. It's exciting to get paper from its seed pods and their attachments and paper from it's stems as well.

From http://plants.usda.gov/
Division Magnoliophyta - Flowering plants
Class Magnoliopsida - Dicotyledons
Subclass Dilleniidae -
Order Capparales -
Family Brassicaceae - Mustard family
Genus Lunaria L. - lunaria
It's in the wonderful fiber full mustard family!


Though I enjoy papermaking with plants, I seldom use plant inclusions. Lunaria has changed that. The bleached outers look as lovely as the inners on this paper (narcissus leaves, hemp, NZ flax and abaca).







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Papermaking From Plants:

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