Some of the primitive crafts I make use paper and I like to have the paper look grungy so I thought I’d do a tutorial with a few different methods you can use to age paper to give it an antique look.
Watch the Video Tutorial:
Age the Paper:
You could use any type of paper for this tutorial. I am using printer paper and scrapbook paper. It is possible the ink on the scrapbooking paper could run, but I didn’t have any trouble with the piece I used.
You will want to use a pan that is wide enough you can slide the paper through to get it wet.
Pour your coffee or tea into the pan. Tea produces the lightest look. The stronger the coffee, the darker the aged look will be.
Slide the paper through the pan, getting it completely wet as it passes through. Set the paper on a towel to dry.
For my first piece, I used 1-1/2 cups of hot water and added 1 Tablespoon of instant coffee. I also tried a sheet of paper with 2 Tablespoons of instant coffee.
I added some cinnamon to the instant coffee mixture for another sheet and then dyed some scrapbooking paper. The cinnamon gives it an even grungier look, but most of it brushed off after the paper was dry. Probably not the best way to age paper if you are going to run it through your printer!
I also took a piece of paper and folded it before submerging it in the coffee mixture. I left it folded while it dried. I wadded one page up somewhat and let it dry that way to give it a wrinkled look.
Finally, I tried a piece in some tea and one paper in tea with cinnamon.
The Results:
After letting everything dry and pressing it with my iron and a pressing cloth, here’s how it all turned out.
As you can see, the coffee makes the paper grungier than the tea.
The wadded up paper was sitting on the very edge of one of the tea dyed papers and it left a water spot. This might be something to try again – but on purpose next time!
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