Useful Uses For Handmade Paper

The handmade papers on the left are folded into envelopes and used as very rustic stationary. The envelopes have two paper layers, the white paper for the base layer is made from the bast fibers or the stripped inner bark of hibiscus branches. Each branch is cut, peeled and cooked. Hibiscus paper is naturally very white and soft like cotton. The second layer of paper is made from a mixture of different plant fibers, the dominant brown flecks come from the shed leaf sheaths of a Monstera plant. The leaf sheaths are reddish to dark brown in color. The fibers are very coarse and really hard to break down. I love the effects from this plant, the papers have a really lacy look to them and are a great combination layered with papers made from softer, blotterlike fibers such as hibiscus.