Printing on Khadi Mulberry Tissue

 I was asked,  "Can you print on Khadi Mulberry Tissue?"  & to be honest I didn't know.

Khadi's Mulberry tissue is very soft & lightweight, with a fairly open weave. It also feels absorbent & tears easily too, so getting it through an inkjet printer would be one thing, never mind whether it accepted the ink.

I used a low-tack tape to tape the tissue onto normal copier paper to act as a carrier. On the first attempt the mechanism that pulls the paper into the printer, tore the tissue away from the backing & couldn't feed it through. For the second go I left some space at the leading edge....

... and this worked fine. I had a couple more trials... an inch wasn't enough space.... 2 inches worked fine. Don't forget to allow a deeper space at the top of your word (or whatever) document for this tho'! 

Also, one side of the mulberry tissue feels ever so slightly smoother... I tried printing on both sides & there was no perceptible difference.

I couldn't get the tape off without tearing the tissue... not a problem as I would tear the edges anyway, but it is a factor to be aware of in terms of the size of the finished piece. You can tear much straighter edges than these, against a ruler, or even cut them, if that is the look you want.

The bottom sheet of carrier paper picked up some great textures too.... so worth considering a "better" paper for this task to use as a background for something else later...

...or just to layer underneath the mulberry. Mulberry tissue is neither fully transparent nor opaque... it really depends how close to the background it is. The background colour makes a difference to the overall look too, so there are certainly many avenues to explore with this!

So, is it possible to print on Khadi Mulberry Tissue? Definitely, yes... but it does take some care. It's not hard to do but you do need a bit of experimenting to get the set-up working for you. 

I went on to try various writing tools & mediums, but will follow that up in a separate post :-)

Covering a Mount/Matt

Sometimes, the colours of mount-board available just don't suit certain pieces of work. I think calligraphers especially have this problem, as the paper is often as much a part of the work as the calligraphy & any decoration. Black or white paper, & hand made papers usually look more streamlined if the mount is covered in the same paper as that used for the lettering.

It's really quite easy to do....

an extra little strip on the inside is especially important when using dark/coloured paper

~ if the mount shows underneath it can be quite unsightly, but this helps disguise it.

we could stop there, but now & again, an extra layer of sheer, gauzy tissue

adds another dimension ~ in this case

japanese sanwaa tissue, with gold & silver flecks in it.

you could actually cut the paper flush to the mount at the external edge, 

especially when the paper is stiff or bulky, as i did below...

don't forget to fold the paper tight against the mount before you glue

for  a nice clean edge

This is the finished piece I showed in the earlier post here