Making paper

Uses environmental materials, requires baking and beating. A bit like making stale bread.

Some plants other than trees are suitable for paper-making. In areas without significant forests, bamboo has been used for paper pulp, as has straw and sugarcane. Flax,Most paper is made by a mechanical or chemical process.hemp, and jute fibers are commonly used for textiles and rope making, but they can also be used for paper. Some high-grade cigarette paper is made from flax.Cotton and linen rags are used in fine-grade papers such as letterhead and resume paper, and for bank notes and security certificates. The rags are usually cuttings and waste from textile and garment mills. The rags must be cut and cleaned, boiled, and beaten before they can be used by the paper mill.Other materials used in paper manufacture include bleaches and dyes, fillers such as chalk, clay, or titanium oxide, and sizings such as rosin, gum, and starch.

Read more: http://www.madehow.com/Volume-2/Paper.html#ixzz6D2x7F7mc

Imagine taking stalks of young hemp plants and pounding them lengthwise under heat, using a fish net support.  Your goal is to simply re-create bamboo pads, for cheap. Dry the pad out, it makes  canvas for writing and art. Hemp rope was a real thing at the time, working with plant fibers, like cotton, long since established. 

But parchment was damn good, used for high quality writing up until the 16th century.