Buzeon Paper Museum

There are many versions of the origin of the expression “to carry water in a sieve”. You can learn about one of them if you visit the only museum of paper in Russia – “Buzeon”. The museum presents the history of the development of paper production from its beginning to the present day. There are many mechanisms associated with the production of paper in different eras. One of them is a model of a water hammer mill from the 17th century which perfectly demonstrates how paper was cast in ancient times. Water was poured into the mortar, then rags were thrown into it and grinded. According to the museum, this is how the well-known idiom originated.

The Buzeon Paper Museum was opened two years ago at the initiative of Dmitry Alexandrovich Dulkin, general director of the United Paper Factory, which includes the Polotnyano-Zavodsky Paper Manufactory, one of the oldest paper-producing enterprises in Russia that is still operating. The linen factory was founded in 1718 by the personal decree of Peter the Great. It occupied a leading position at the end of the 18th century. The museum is located on its territory in the historical industrial building.

In the Buzeon one can learn almost everything about paper, see samples of Japanese, Arabic, French, Russian handmade paper from the 18th–19th centuries, look at newsreels devoted to the paper production of the USSR during the first five-year plans, the Great Patriotic war, and the 1960s, take a virtual tour of the existing workshops of the Polotnyano-Zavodsky Paper Manufactory, and even make a sheet of paper and take part in a master class on creating decorative products using the “cutting”, papier-mache, and origami techniques.

“The idea of creating a museum was in the air. The linen factory is one of the three cradles of the Russian paper industry. St. Petersburg, Yaroslavl, and Kaluga are three places where the first paper factories in Russia were opened. The museum is located in the interiors of a paper manufactory from the 18th century with an old landscape preserved near it; there is a water channel and settling ponds. Therefore, its appearance is historically conditioned. However, the role of the individual in history has not been cancelled. If six years ago Dmitry Alexandrovich Dulkin did not decide to restore the building that is in decline, the museum might not have appeared,” – says director of the Buzeon Paper Museum, Konstantin Gavrilenko.

Dmitry Alexandrovich Dulkin, Doctor of Technical Sciences, graduated from Moscow State Technical University named after N. E. Bauman, He felt annoyed that in Russia, during the technical reequipment of enterprises, equipment samples and industrial catalogues were not saved as they were in Europe and around the world, but rather simply destroyed. In addition, almost every country in Europe had its own paper museum, or even more than one. Surprisingly, there was no such museum in Russia. The country that ranks as one of the highest positions in the cellulose and paper production in the world, a forested country, did not have this type of industrial museum. The creation of the museum was an attempt to improve the situation and preserve the history of the industry.