I have been purchasing top-quality hosho paper for my printmaking for many decades. Far and away most of the paper was of course 'used up' in making prints, which have become scattered all over the world. But almost from the very beginning I made a habit of saving the final couple of sheets from each 'lot', and putting them aside.

On Friday, Sadako and I spent most of the day digging through the scattered stacks and got everything organized. The washi is now sorted by paper type, each piece labelled with date and description, and carefully stacked for storage.

Why?

I think that having this decades-long record of paper from a single source (the Iwano family) available for research, provides a unique opportunity for study into the production of washi during this period. I myself will never get to it - my focus is the printmaking - but I am confident that sometime, someplace, this will be very useful to somebody.

Possibly the paper hasn't changed all that much in just a few decades. A hundred year collection would be much more useful.

Hey, you have to start somewhere!