| The first step in katazome is the creation of a stencil. The stencil is made of shibugami, a handmade Japanese paper. The extremely durable shibugami is made of layers of paper laminated together with persimmon juice, then smoke-cured. In the picture below, I'm using an exacto knife to carve a traditional Japanese pattern of wisteria and a swallow. |  | | After a silk netting is permanently applied to the stencil with paint, a hera (wooden spatula) is used to apply a paste made of steamed glutinous rice flour and rice bran onto cloth through the stencil. With care, the stencil can be reused many, many times. | 
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| Once the paste has dried, dyes are painted over it, as in the picture below. No need to stay within the lines - the paste does the work, “resisting” the dye, meaning that the areas which were covered with paste will not be able to receive the dye.
|  | In order to remove the paste, the cloth is simply soaked in water, a process that takes about half an hour. The areas that were covered by the paste are now revealed. By the time the cloth is fully pasted, it's a crusty mess, so it's always a delight to see the final product...
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How It's Done 
