Kashmiri Papier-Mache

  • 60
Time

Benefits
  • Time Together
  • Bring Joy

Participants
  • Group Activity

What you need

  1. Newspaper
  2. PVA glue
  3. Paint brushes for gluing and some for painting
  4. Water
  5. Balloons
  6. Acrylic paints (a variety of vibrant colours)
  7. Scissors

Intro

Kashmir in Pakistan is famous for its beautiful bowls, boxes, and other small objects handmade from papier-mâché. (Did you know that papier-mâché is the French word for "chewed paper"?!) They intricately paint them with beautiful flowers, patterns, animals and birds – sometimes with just a single goat hair!

Let’s make some papier-mâché bowls of our own and paint them, Kashmiri style! This is a 2-part activity, as you’ll need to let your paper creation dry before bringing it to life with colour.

Top tip

Not everyone likes the bang of a popped balloon! So do the popping for them if preferable

The Activity

Follow these steps to paint the bowls:

  1. Lay out the paints on the table
  2. Give each person their bowl back
  3. Pop the balloon and remove
  4. Trim the top of the bowl with scissors, if needed
  5. Paint the bowl in a light colour (cream or white) as a base coat, inside and out
  6. Leave the paint to dry – this may mean the session goes over to another day or later the same day
  7. Encourage the person or group to think about the colours and designs they would like to create
  8. If in a group, have a cuppa and chat about your designs – this could inspire ideas
  9. Lay out the chosen paints and start painting
  10. Once finished, leave to dry
  11. These bowls are great for holding bits and bobs, or for giving as a gift.
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