Papermaking Japanese knotweed

One major threat to local biodiversity around the Oslo fjord is the spreading of alien invasive species. Japanese knotweed (Fallopia Japonica) is one of the largest and most spreading invasive plants in the area. It creates large thickets and displaces all other plants where it settles. The design project “Missing Species” uses the invasive plant Japanese knotweed as the base material to shed light on the plant extinction Japanese knotweed causes. Handmade paper was made from the fibres of the plant. Making handmade paper is a comprehensive process that requires cooking, hammering, and chopping to split the fibres before distributing them in water with okra and scooping them up by a screen. Further on the fibres must dry to form a flat sheet. The process required several attempts as older stems of Japanese knotweed are too stiff and the young ones are too soft.

Images from top left:
1. the plant Japanese knotweed, 2. chopped stems, 3. cooking stems, 4. hammering stems to soften them, 5. chopping in blender, 6. scooping the pulp onto screen, 7. drying the Japanese knotweed paper, and finally cutting the holes of the missing species.