The UK gets through 83 km2 of wrapping paper every Christmas. Friends of the Earth have calculated that this is equivalent to 50, 000 trees a year… Technically speaking, the definition of paper is "a complex matted web of cellulose fibres". Our ancestors could write on parchment (made from animal skins) and papyrus (peeled layers of plant fibres), but the first real paper was know about was created in 105AD in China. It was made out of a mix of mulberry bark, linen, and hemp. Although most paper nowadays is made from wood-pulp, you can make it out of all sorts of materials. A few centuries ago, fibres from old rags were the most commonly used material. And it’s thought that paper made from infected rags may have been the way that the Plague found its way to Britain from the Continent… Even more disgusting than that, the Victorians used ground-up Egyptian Mummies to make both wrapping paper and toilet paper!

	Marbling Make you own beautiful wrapping paper with the science of immiscible* liquids and the ancient Japanese Art of marbling... (*by the way, "immiscible" means "incapable of being mixed".)
	You will need:
	Paper (it must have a semi-absorbent surface, so not waxed "shiny" paper) Wall paper paste Oil based paints thinned with a little turpentine Washing up basin (clean!)
	Mix up a watery consistency of wallpaper paste in your washing up basin (if you have ready-mixed paste, add some water). It will need to be at least a couple of cm’s deep.
	Drop your thinned paints onto the surface of the paste, where they will float (to keep your hands clean, you may want to use pipettes for this, if you have any handy). You can mix colours around to make patterns with a bit of cardboard but be careful to mix only the paint floating on the surface, don’t beat the colours into your wallpaper paste. Lay the paper lightly on the surface, lift off, and put aside to dry. And admire your instant art handiwork! Don’t touch it for at least a day though or until it’s dry, or you’ll smudge all your lovely patterns.