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Web site designed and
maintained by Kate Palmer
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Ageing Paper
MATERIALS
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Coffee |
Dye
ink |
| Tea |
Paper or card |
| Water |
Bucket for soaking paper/card in |
| Stippling brush |
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PROCEDURE
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Coffee
–
Mix a very strong brew of instant
coffee (6 heaped tablespoons to 6 cups of hot water) and
place into a container that will allow each piece of paper
or card to lay flat. Place paper/card into coffee bath
one sheet at a time and make sure each piece gets coated
well. As the card/paper sinks gently poke with a spoon
or chopstick to create small creases – as these will absorb
more stain that the surrounding paper. Lightly rubbing
with sandpaper will give a similar effect, though rougher.
Leave to soak for 3 hours (for a light stain) or overnight
or longer (for a darker stain). Remove from bath and
dry flat on absorbent paper (newspaper works fine). To
create an even more aged appearance spoon additional liquid
coffee mixture over paper (once out of bath) making sure
there are pools of liquid. Sprinkle instant coffee
granules over paper and into pools and leave to dry.
This will give you a paper that has marks that look like
water stains and age spots. Coffee staining can be
used to create a wonderful illusion of age and depending on
the methods you use can look anything from subtle (as does
the base paper) or very distressed. |
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Tea –
As can be seen
from the base page (tea
staining on the bottom of the page) tea stain gives a redder brown than does
coffee. For tea staining use 1½ tea bags per cup of liquid and follow
coffee directions above. Again the length of time spent in the tea
solution alters the depth of the stain. Short periods (not less than
3-4 hours) will result in a very light stain, while longer periods (1-2
days) will result in a much darker stain. To achieve a more mottled
appearance try these different techniques:
1. Stain paper in tea bath, remove and lay flat. Spoon liquid used for
staining onto paper and allow to pool. Pounce discarded tea bags onto paper
for great effect. Leave to dry.
2. Roughen up paper using sandpaper or scrunching to give a more creased and
aged result.
3. Try out some of those specialty teas like Cranberry, Raspberry and Elderflower,
they smell great and produce gorgeous results. |
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Dye
Ink
– I like to use Ancient Page
or Adirondak dye inks for this technique and will often use dye ink in
conjunction with coffee or tea aged papers for greater effect. Choose
either one or two dye ink colours, two shades of brown work well eg:
Espresso and Chocolate – as used in this sample. Tap a
stipple brush (stiff haired paintbrush) directly onto the pad
and then gently tap onto the paper until desired depth of colour
is achieved. Use the lightest colour first and the darker
colour to finish – you may want to tap some of the ink off onto
a piece of scrap paper especially when using the second colour,
so as to avoid any blotches. Starting from the outside
edges of the paper and working in towards the middle without
re-inking the brush gives a nice effect. |
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HINTS & TIPS
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Staining not dark enough? Then mix up a really strong
brew and soak overnight - still not enough, then drip the stain
directly onto the card/paper and leave to dry. |
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