Making Nettle Paper

My homemade nettle paper

 

Recently I've been making nettle paper with my daughter and the help of Helen Cook's pamphlet - Making Paper from Stinging Nettles.  To be honest, I got to do the fun bit.  My daughter had already picked the nettles, striped them, soaked and retted them.

Helen Cook - Making Paper from Stinging Nettles

We took the retted nettle fibre...

Retted Nettle Fibre

and with some tweakments added it to a washing up bowl of water...

Our equipment - nettle fibre, washing up bowl and water, scissors, mould and deckle

and then scooped up the nettle fibre with the mould and deckle...

Mould and deckle with nettle fibre

The soon to be paper was then tipped out onto a tea towel and sandwiched between some felt.  Then you have to apply something heavy to squeeze the water out...

Something heavy must be applied to squeeze the water out

Then the paper is left to dry... 

You have to peel off the dried paper from whatever it's drying on...

And there you have it - paper from stinging nettles.  I think we need to refine our mould and deckle technique to get a more consistent thickness of paper that covers the whole mould without any holes in the sheet of paper...  

Nettle paper of varying thicknesses

I plan to do some stitching in my nettle paper.  Watch this space...

Delcy Morelos - origo - Barbican, London

Delcy Morelos - origo

 

Delcy Morelos is a Columbian artist who makes all of her artworks by hand.  Her large installation, origo, made of soil, was outside the Barbican, London, until the end of July 2026.  

Meaning origin in latin, origo, was inspired by Andean and Amazonian traditional world views.  The material it was formed from, soil/earth, is seen as life giving and receiving, where food is grown and bodies are buried - the cycle of life.

Delcy Morelos - origo surface

It was 24m wide and took 10 tonnes of earth and clay that was applied over a month by Morelos and her team.  It consisted of a mixture of cinnamon, cloves, hay, soil and clay (and perhaps a little concrete?). It was rock hard and was applied over a wooden structure. 

Polo shaped, though more elliptical than round, part of it is like a tunnel/cave that you can walk through.  Internally it is quite dark and plant matter hangs down from the sides. Morelos calls the cave like structures within origo, profundis, and these are deemed to resemble burial sites.  Morelos sees the installation as both monumental (in scale) and humble (in terms of its materials). 

Delcy Morelos - Inside origo

It is pierced by a number of trapezoidal doorways into the structure and through it. (see first and last images) 

Origo appears suspended as though it is hovering just above ground level...

Delcy Morelos - Floating origo

The installation and the Barbican bear the traces of touch and a shared texture - origo by its handmade nature, and the Barbican with its rough concrete finish.

I got to see origo at the end of its show and would have liked to have seen it in the making too.  (And I would've liked to have tried climbing on it but that wasn't allowed).  It would have been even more impressive if it was twice the height and made entirely of soil and clay but I imagine time, resources and health & safety concerns probably precluded that.

Twined Pod Forms with Spiral Patterns - Mary Crabb

My finished pod forms

 

Recently I went on a course, led by Mary Crabb, to learn how to create twined pod forms with spiral patterns.  It was one of West Dean College's short courses at their Bloomsbury Campus in London.

Mary Crabb

Mary Crabb's pod forms with spiral patterns

Mary is a skilled basketmaker. Having started out working in willow, Mary now makes small woven creations using both natural and man-made materials to create detailed, decorative forms using twining, looping and coiling techniques.

Mary Crabb's pod forms with some more complicated spiral patterns

We were here to learn how to make twined forms with a spiral pattern which Mary demonstrated for us and also provided notes as an aide memoire.  We worked with paper yarn in a range of colours using thicker yarn for the warp and thinner yarn for the weft.

Thick paper yarn (used for the warp) and thin paper yarn (used for the weft)

We started by making a small simple sample to get the hang of the process.  Here's mine...

My sample

After that we moved on to our main piece of the day which had a spiral pattern.  I opted to do a simple spiral but other participants were more adventurous and went for wider 4 colour spirals which Mary explained.

My simple spiral pod form

We also began another piece which I finished at home with a slightly more adventurous two row spiral...

My pod form with a deeper spiral

At the end of the day we put our pod forms out so everyone could have a look...

Everyone's pod forms

It was a super day and although progress was slow as it often is with handmade craft, it was very enjoyable.  Thank you, Mary and West Dean.

My initial sample finished as a small pod form with a simple spiral