Inside Chicago Pulp, A New Bridgeport Studio Where Making Paper Takes Time

Block Club Chicago (01/14/26) Filbin, Patrick

Chicago Pulp is a new papermaking studio in the Bridgeport neighborhood of Chicago. Occupying the basement of a local industrial building, it is the brainchild of co-founders and co-owners Aidan Anne Frierson and Dave King. The two School of the Art Institute of Chicago alums have embraced slowness — making paper by hand and building a space where the process matters as much as the finished sheet. Early on, the pairing was unlikely. Frierson was a teaching assistant at the Institute, but had already fallen deeply into the world of handmade paper. King had returned to school following a long career running his family's HVAC and sheet metal business in suburban Oak Park. A class introduced King to artists using paper as a sculptural medium instead of a flat surface and he "was completely hooked after that," he says. Frierson and King bonded over the physical demands of the process, then over the shared frustration familiar to many art students: access. The class ended, and they were cut off from the equipment needed to keep working. Frierson started processing pulp for King outside of school and that became the foundation of their partnership. Since opening, Chicago Pulp has drawn an array of first-timers, long-time artists and recent art school graduates. The mill offers classes and open studio sessions where people can participate in the slow, intentional labor of papermaking.

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