The Japanese Paper-making & Bookbinding Intensive is designed to give students the unique opportunity to learn three distinct Japanese crafts: Nagashizuki hand papermaking, natural dyeing and cover decoration, and hand bookbinding. Each day, we will build upon skills learned in previous sessions to create a body of work that is considerate of the resources, materials, and aesthetics that define Japanese bookmaking. Students can expect to leave this workshop with a collection of hand-bound books housed as well as a stack of luscious hand-dyed decorative papers to use for further exploration.

On the first day of the workshop, we will begin by making our paper using traditional Nagashizuki methods. Our focus will be on fiber preparation and sheet formation well as traditional pressing and drying techniques. Additionally, we will explore Hangami papermaking, a hybrid style of sheet forming used to create soft backing papers for book covers. On the second day, we will learn several traditional methods for decorating the paper we made, including brush and dip dyeing with natural dyes common to Japan, such as kakishibu (persimmon tannin), clove, and indigo, as well as burnishing and embossing techniques using carved stone and wood blocks. We will also cover shibori, a manual resist dyeing technique for creating patterns in cloth and paper that dates to the 8th century, as well as momigami, a folding and crumpling technique (also known as kneaded paper) that strengthens the paper and gives it the appearance of leather.

We will then use our handmade decorative papers to create laminated cover papers for our bindings. Students will have the opportunity to work from blocks carved with traditional Japanese patterns to emboss their papers for historical effect. On the third day, we will use these materials to bind three traditional Japanese books: the ledger, multi-section, and stab binding.

Presentation on Historic Edo Period hand papermaking and cover-making, Nagashizuki hand papermaking

Hangami recycled papermaking with ink removal method, pressing and drying techniques

Natural dyeing(methods for brush and vat dyeing with Indigo, clove, and kakishibu), Shibori and momigami techniques

Cover lamination

Burnishing and embossing techniques

Cover preparation, Japanese ledger binding

Japanese multi-section binding

Traditional Japanese binding with inner binding

Anne Covell is a book artist, edition bookbinder, and hand papermaker. She holds an MFA in Book Arts from the University of Iowa Center for the Book, where she was the recipient of an Iowa Arts Fellowship. She studied Asian and Western paper-making techniques with Timothy Barrett and has taught for numerous