Paper doesn’t have to come from trees. Or so Juan Manuel de la Rosa thought around 2000.
The Mexican artist arrived in the tiny colonial town of Barichara with a single idea: make paper out of natural fibers. No chemicals. No wood pulp. Just plant matter.
It wasn’t just a fleeting project. The workshop opened permanently in 2001.
They started small. Local fique fiber did the heavy lifting first. Then? The palette expanded. Pineapple leaves, aloe vera, papyrus. The garden behind the workshop feeds the mill. It is a closed loop.
Where do they do the work? Inside the old warehouse of the Colombian Tabaco Company. Irony aside, the space suits them.
Nine local women run the show.
“Paper making is communal, tactile, and slow.”
Visitors aren’t kept at arm’s length. You can join the process. Dip the sheet. Press it dry.
They sell more than just paper. Actually, they barely sell raw sheets. Instead, you’ll find jewellery. Lamps. Toy animals hanging like mobiles in the air. Art prints and handmade books too. Everything starts as fiber. Ends as an object.
You can touch it all. Even the dye plants grow there, rooted in the same soil that provides the base material.
So you buy a lamp, but what you really took home? The method.
