How is Paper Made?
A typographic book showing the process of paper creation, from plant to pulp to paper in hand.
The spreads in this book show the process of paper creation from start to finish using exclusively typography. As an illustrator, I decided to challenge myself by creating a book exclusively out of text. Instead of illustrating the actual process (i.e. the machines, the trees), I illustrated the type in a way that would suggest the process. I wanted the type to feel textural and tactile as opposed to typical flat typography.
I first figured out the way that I wanted the compositions to look by sketching out the type in black and white. I didn’t yet know what textures I wanted to include on the words, so I was primarily sketching in silhouettes. I used the words to create images on the page, such as the water droplets seen above. I then turned these silhouettes into outline drawings in order to add the textures that I wanted to each shape.
Finally I added color to support the illustration, both to add interest and to make the shapes more recognizable as what they are. I also arranged them in a way that filled the wide pages in a more natural way.
On some pages, the words do not form a recognizable shape, but instead suggest a material through their texture, form, and color. On this page, the words drip in a sickly yellow color as though they are the chemicals used in the paper-making process.
Color was also used to illustrate the process on some pages. On this spread I reverse the foreground and background colors from the first page to the second while keeping the fluffy pulpy texture the same to show that the brown paper pulp has now been bleached white.