Scrapbooking paper: varieties and tips for choosing

In the modern world, even an ordinary person has access to a huge variety of different goods, but they are all relatively the same type. In mass production, even the presence of two dozen varieties of the product does not mean the originality of the owner. In such conditions, the demand for things made with one's own hand is growing rapidly - consumables for creativity, as a rule, are also limited in assortment, but each collects a combination of them at his own discretion and puts his own soul into the product, which makes the final product unique. In recent years, such a hobby as scrapbooking has become insanely popular, and if earlier scrapbooks were made literally from everything that came to hand, today's industry allows you to produce special paper.

Despite the fact that scrapbooking is usually called a newfangled "hipster" hobby, in fact, it arose a long time ago. In Western Europe, the tradition of creating their own albums with various memorabilia, favorite quotes and poems, partially duplicating the functions of a diary, arose at least four centuries ago. A century and a half later, it became fashionable for girls to collect the hair of their friends, fix it in an album, decorate with flowers and braid strands in pigtails. 200 years ago, with the rapid development of printed periodicals, such albums began to move more and more from texts to images cut from newspapers and magazines, then they were supplemented by photographs.

Previously, of course, absolutely any albums were used for such purposes, but today scrap paper is produced, created specifically for scrapbooking. The main difference between this material and classic paper is the absence of lignin and acid in the first. Lignin is present in the composition of wood, which is the main raw material for the paper industry, but in the end it also turns out to be a "weak link" - over time, its structure collapses, and an acid gives about the same effect.

For cheap paper sheets that do not pretend to be forever, the presence of lignin is normal - no one deliberately extracts it from wood. You can understand what this is fraught with using the example of how any old newspaper looks, especially if it is a priori cheap - its sheets must have turned yellow and look rotten.

Scrapbook is usually designed to keep memories in all details, a person makes it for himself, because the moments captured in the album are very important, and most importantly, they are unique. The photographs present here and especially the drawings could have been preserved in a single copy, therefore special scrap paper (this includes all its types, where lignin is less than 1%) is needed for the longest possible preservation of an attractive appearance. The manufacturer usually focuses the consumer's attention on the fact that there is no lignin in his products, as this makes the sheets more expensive and attractive to the buyer. People who understand scrapbooking well prefer to use only such material.

At the same time, scrap paper today is used not only for the manufacture of albums, but also for the release of some other products with an eye to durability - for example, they make postcards, sketchbooks and the like from it. If you think that some notes and drawings should never lose their original appearance, it is best to use lignin-free scrap paper for storing them.

The classification of scrap paper sheets is very extensive - there are a huge number of varieties of this product, as well as many criteria by which you can choose a product.

First of all, this material, like any other paper, differs in thickness and density, which are most often proportional. Most varieties of this material have a density in the range of 150-260 g / m2, which is much higher than that of ordinary writing paper used in everyday life. Many reviews say that thickness and density do not affect the durability of the sheet, but this is true only in terms of what is drawn or written.

As a rule, the density is indicated on the packaging or, for many domestic manufacturers, on the sheet itself. At the same time, some manufacturers prefer to get off not with specific numbers, but with general terms like "thin" or "dense".

In addition, scrap paper can be single-sided and double-sided. The fact is that for the sake of being used for decorative purposes, the material is often already decorated with colored drawings of a certain theme, in which it is very similar to wallpaper. Like the finishing material for walls, scrap paper can be decorated not only with images, but also with a certain texture, which can also add tactile memories to visual memories. Accordingly, a single-sided sheet has a "face" with applied patterns and texture and a modest underside, while a double-sided sheet has both sides a "face".

In addition to texture, scrap paper can also have a gloss or remain dull. Everything is clear here - the matte version does not shine even in the bright sun, but the glossy one, on the contrary, shimmers with bright highlights.

Separately, it is worth highlighting the acetate sheet, which is not paper, but plastic, but often belongs to the category of scrap paper. By itself, it is usually transparent, but both monochrome and color images can be applied over it. In scrapbooks, it is usually used as a separator for "chapters", periods of life included in the album.

Scrap paper is also classified by sheet size. Naturally, the standard length and width of the latter could completely kill the original intention, which was that each album should be as unique as the memories. Focusing on satisfying the creative impulses of potential customers, modern manufacturers offer a choice of sheets of any size.

As is the case with many other products, the average consumer rarely wants to get into technical details and figure out which numbers will satisfy him - he just needs a good product for a reasonable price. This is especially true for beginners in any business, including scrapbooking, for whom it is easier to remember the name of a certain manufacturer or set than to delve into the details to understand what could be a worthy alternative.

We will deliberately not consider the most expensive and high-quality samples of scrap paper in our list, since such a product is more interesting to professionals, but they certainly navigate the assortment themselves, and are also used to relying on the numerical characteristics of the product in their choice. Since our selection of kits is aimed at beginners and not the most experienced scrapbookers, there will be many purely children's solutions in it. Those who are looking for something really special should pay attention to products under the brands Lena Vinogradova, Melissa Frances, K & Company, Kaiser Craft, Teresa Collins, Graphic 45 and some others.

As for the sets we have promised and are popular in our country, the following examples are on our list.

• "Snow White Rainbow Colors" - a relatively expensive set of one-sided scrap paper for a girl, which is good for the unequal design of individual sheets. While the designs are not identical, there is a general concept that allows them to be combined in one order or another.

• "Alto" is a set of colored corrugated cardboard sheets. Consumers note that the material is quite tough and not so easy to process, but for a start at a not very early age, it is good both for the price, and the choice of colors, and the large A4 format.

• Fleur design, as the name of the brand itself (by the way, eminent one) suggests, produces scrap paper decorated with flowers. At the same time, the main field remains monochromatic, allowing you to use most of the space for creative experiments, but the floral ornament along the edges will create the appropriate mood.

• Stamperia produces double-sided sheets, which it is even a pity to occupy with some personal photographs or creativity, since they themselves resemble a real work of art. The brand's assortment includes sheets with decor for any theme, from vintage and retro to modern technology, from fairy tales to believable reality. Such scrap paper is more often used for decoration, its only drawback is its relatively low strength - it breaks even too easily.

• Mr. Painter No. 2 Is a product of a popular Russian manufacturer of scrap paper, which stands out for its attention not only to color, but also to black and white solutions such as this one. The peculiarity of the set is that the sheets here have an attractive curly edging.

• "Application Our Baby", as the name suggests, it is designed in the style of a small child, and will be most interesting for preschoolers and primary school students. The set is suitable as a starting point for a child who is just getting acquainted with scrapbooking, each of the sheet options is presented in a set in two copies, in order to give inept children's hands a second chance to create the perfect craft.

• Heyda - a German manufacturer of goods for scrapbooking and handicrafts, which in our country is known largely for its very dense and bright cardboard, suitable for a variety of purposes, and most importantly - amazingly durable.

• Aluvision - rather stiff cardboard, characterized by high density, and, therefore, the inability to bend. When creating scrapbooks, this material is often used to create a binding.

• "Handicraft Patterns and Polka Dots" exploits the theme of various ornaments - such material is unlikely to be suitable for creating full-fledged pages, but it is perfect for pasting edges and free fields. The set is sold in A4 format. Such tracing paper is distinguished by a certain transparency, therefore, when gluing it, you need to use a special adhesive, because the stains of simple PVA are visible through the ornament.

• Scrapberry's Is one of the most recognizable brands of scrapbooking products around the world, usually double-sided paper with the widest range in terms of design. Despite all the attractiveness of the company's kits, its designers usually do not really care about some kind of general compatibility, because sheets from different kits often do not look within the same scrapbook.

• ScrapLike "Vintage" is one of the best solutions for scrapbooking if the end result should seem much more antique than it actually is. There are not so many design options, but it should be admitted that the designers tried and really managed to convey the spirit of antiquity.

• "Vine Fabulous Dreams" - a good version of tracing paper in a translucent design, decorated with patterns in the form of curls. The bleaching of the material takes place without the use of chlorine.

With a diligent approach to choosing beautiful paper for scrapbooking, you may find that the number of options available on the market is even too large - sometimes your eyes simply run up from it. Newbies in this situation will try to pick up that scrap paper, whose design most accurately conveys their original idea, and this will be a mistake - it is impossible to focus only on the appearance of the product, regardless of what we choose.

The first thing to decide on is the purpose for which you are generally going to buy something. Newbies in scrapbooking often like the attractive appearance of paper and they rush to purchase an album or set of sheets they like, and then they do not know what to do with it so that it does not look worse. Even if scrapbooking is clearly your occupation, you should still not buy the paper you like simply because it caught your eye, because sometimes the decor depicted is so original that you simply won't find how to use the purchase.

It's another matter if you have a rough vision of the final product and you go for the material just for it. For example, if you need to make a single homemade postcard, there is no need to buy an album or a whole set - many manufacturers produce scrap paper in sheets by the piece. In a situation where the ultimate goal is a self-assembled album with wedding photographs, it is important not only to purchase a sufficient amount of material, but also to think over the binding method. Again, a wedding album needs one sheet design, a completely different design for baby photos, and a third for a collection of favorite recipes.

One of the most important criteria for choosing scrap paper is its size, since no attractive design will help you out if the clipping or photo simply does not fit into the binder.

Density is also critical. Despite the fact that even thin scrap paper has a significant thickness and density (up to 190 g / m2), it is almost never used as independent pages - although it will not fade, it will quickly tear and fray. For this reason, thin sheets or their fragments are only pasted over thick (from 190 g / m2) scrap paper to give it a certain look... But the latter also does not always look mediocre - it can also be decorated with bright colors or at least simple black and white drawings, but if not, it is still used as the main background and material for covers.

The choice between single-sided and double-sided paper is obvious in many cases. The two-sided option, for obvious reasons, is more expensive, it also looks more attractive, but at the same time at least one side of it will be sealed with third-party materials - it turns out that such an expense may turn out to be unjustified.

It is necessary to decide on the presence or absence of texture and shine in each case individually, starting from the goals and objectives of a particular scrapbook. For example, for a winter theme, gloss is usually needed because glare is typical for snow and ice. If the task is to artificially age the pages of an album, then you need not just a matte surface, but also a characteristic rough surface.

When choosing scrap paper, you must also remember that it is sold both in sets and individually. The advantages of the album are obvious - you buy a significant amount of goods as if at a wholesale price, while individual sheets often have a different, but thematically general design and go well with each other. This solution is optimal if you plan to work a lot with exactly the theme that the designers played in a specific set. Separate sheets usually cost a little more, but you can weed out the "appendage" in the form of unnecessary volumes of paper of a certain design or additional sheets that are clearly inferior to the one you like.

Finally, it should be said that many consumers pay too much attention to the scrap paper manufacturer, which is not always justified. Even among the well-known brands, most of the production facilities are located in China today, so if, in principle, you don’t really trust goods from the Middle Kingdom, you still don’t have much choice - you will have to put up with it. It is still worth focusing more on the density and design of the product, and these two indicators can be worthy for Chinese products as well.

Scrapbooking secrets for a beginner - see the next video.