When we arrive to the site of a workshop, be it on a mountainside or a city street, we bring in tow three cases which hold the crucial elements for papermaking. First and foremost, we have a sturdy wooden box that houses our portable Hollander beater designed by Lee McDonald. The beater weighs 23 pounds without the motor, and can be bicycle powered in areas without electricity. Also in this box, we fit sizing, pigments, overbeaten pulp, sponges, and a length of rope and clothespins for drying the paper. A smaller suitcase holds our motor and miscellaneous rag, linters, and other pulp sheets. The motor is configured to work in America and Europe. Our third suitcase holds interfacing and Luan boards, moulds and deckles, a portfolio of silk screens for pulp printing, and paper samples. Having distilled the studio down to this point, we now add one of the most important ingredients of our recipe: improvisation. Anything can turn into a vat if you're desperate enough. We have even lined our suitcases with trash bags that held up for entire workshops. Buckets are common enough to find and borrow. When it comes to pressing, it is hard to beat the excitement of using a participant's vehicle or a taxi to press the post. Sand bags, park benches, and groups of people can also contribute the necessary weight. By playing with this recipe and altering it to suit different scenarios, it becomes clear how versatile papermaking can be! More importantly, it makes all of the necessary components visible to the public, so that they may move forward with confidence in their own papermaking endeavors.

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