Next, she “couches” the screen on a drying board. A technical term, “couching” means that in one motion the fragile pulp is flipped over and placed face down on the drying board. Ilse carefully peels off the screen, leaving the pulp sheet on the board. She repeats this process until the wood pulp has been used up, placing the boards with the fresh, wet pulp sheets outside to dry in the sun. Ilse can only make paper on sunny days.

The sheets dry quickly and must be rotated occasionally to drain and dry evenly. It is a busy process, forming the sheets and tending to the drying at the same time.

While still damp, the sheets are placed in the binding press with a felt blanket. This part of the process removes excess moisture and binds together any areas of the sheet that may have been separated by bubbles in the molding stage. Finally, the finished sheets of Third & Elm hand made paper are loosely stacked to air and to await printing.

Figure 5a: Couching

Figure 5b: Couching

Figure 6: Peeling the screen

Figure 7a: Drying the sheets

Figure 7b: Rotating the seets

Figure 8: Paper after pressing