Last week I went to Ogawa in Saitama, with my friends Megan and Liz, who are setting up a new online Japanese paper store in Sweden (Japanese Paper Company). They wanted to visit some local papermakers, and learn about the special hosokawa washi that is the local superstar paper.
First we went to see a local community facility where they were stripping the mulberry bark and cleaning it for the first stage of the washi-making process… I even tried it myself. It wasn’t hard, but I could see how time-consuming it would be to get enough kozo (Mulberry) for a year’s worth of paper! The bark can only be harvested in the winter, so they collect enough and dry it for use throughout the year.
We went to another facility to see them actually making the paper, and visited a local craft store (I stocked up on paper!) It’s very physical manual work to mix the paper pulp in water vats and then use screens to produce the individual sheets…
We went to see a local washi artist called Hisako san, and spoke to her about the paper she makes. Her little studio was wonderful and it was obvious how much love and care she puts into her work.
I’d like to say a big thank you to Seiko Musashi who was our guide though all this. If you want to visit too, and learn about Japanese washi paper, just give her a call!