Why I Roll Paper Instead of Doomscrolling (And Why You Should Too)

There is a particular kind of tired that has nothing to do with sleep. It is the tired that comes from answering seventeen emails before 9am, from context-switching between twelve browser tabs, from a brain that never fully gets to exhale. If you know that tired, this post is for you. I found quilling by accident, the way most good things happen. I was looking for something my hands could do while my brain stood down. What I found was a practice that turned out to be less about paper and more about presence.

What Even Is Quilling?

If you are new here, welcome. Paper quilling (also called paper filigree) is the art of rolling, shaping, and arranging thin strips of paper into designs. That is it. That is the whole thing.

A strip of paper. A slotted tool. Your fingers. Time.

You roll the paper around the tool, let it relax into a loose coil, then pinch it into a shape: a teardrop, a marquise, a tight circle, a loose scroll. You arrange those shapes into flowers, mandalas, letters, portraits, abstract patterns. The results can be breathtakingly intricate, but the entry point is genuinely simple. If you can roll paper around a pencil, you can quill.

Starter supplies are minimal:

• Quilling paper strips (3mm is great for beginners)

• A slotted quilling tool (or a toothpick in a pinch)

• Glue (a fine-tip bottle makes life easier)

• A quilling board or corkboard to hold your shapes while they dry

That is really all you need to begin.

The Part Nobody Talks About

Here is what the craft tutorials do not tell you: the making is almost beside the point.

When I sit down to quill, something shifts within the first five minutes. My breathing slows. My shoulders drop from wherever they had been living up by my ears. The mental chatter that follows me everywhere gets quieter, not because I forced it to, but because my hands gave my brain something small and beautiful to pay attention to.

Quilling is slow by design. You cannot rush a coil. The paper does not care about your deadline or your inbox. It will only curl at the pace it curls, and your job is simply to stay with it.

That slowness, which might sound like a flaw, is the whole gift.

We live in a culture that treats speed as virtue. Productivity is a personality trait. Rest has to be earned. Against all of that, sitting down to hand-roll paper strips into tiny flowers feels almost radical. It is a quiet insistence that some things are worth doing slowly, that beauty does not have to be efficient, that your hands deserve to make something just because it is lovely.

Behind the Quill: What a Session Actually Looks Like

My quilling practice is not precious or elaborate. I keep a small tray on my desk with my strips, my tools, and whatever project I am currently working on. When I need a reset, I do not light seventeen candles or put on a specific playlist. I just sit down and start rolling.

Some days I work on a commission piece with intention and focus. Some days I just make coils I do not have a plan for yet. Both are valid. Both work.

I keep my sessions relatively short, usually 20 to 45 minutes, because that is about how long the meditative quality holds before it tips into work. The goal is never productivity. The goal is the quality of those 20 to 45 minutes: the slowing down, the noticing, the small satisfaction of a shape that came out just right.

I call it chilling and quilling for a reason.

A First Project: The Simple Daisy

If you want to try this right now, here is the simplest version of an entry point:

1. Take five strips of the same color. Roll each one around your tool and let it relax to about the size of a dime.

2. Pinch each coil on one side to form a teardrop shape.

3. Arrange your five teardrops in a circle, points facing inward, and glue them down.

4. Roll a tight circle in a contrasting color for the center. Glue it over the points.

You just made a daisy. It took maybe ten minutes. Your brain was somewhere beautiful for those ten minutes.

That is quilling. That is also, I would argue, a form of self-care that does not require a subscription, a wellness app, or anything you do not already mostly have at hand.

The Slow Living Connection

Slow living is not about doing less. It is about doing things fully. It is about choosing presence over efficiency when presence is what actually feeds you.

Quilling fits that philosophy the way few hobbies do. It asks for your attention in exchange for something tangible and beautiful. It returns you to your body. It connects you to a craft tradition that is centuries old. And it produces objects you can hold, gift, hang on a wall, or just look at and remember that your hands made that.

In a life that can feel increasingly abstract, screen-mediated, and disembodied, there is something deeply nourishing about that.

If you are curious about starting, I have supplies, tutorials, and more over at allmyquills.com. And if you just needed to read something today that gave you permission to slow down, consider this it.

Roll something beautiful. Take your time.

What does your version of a creative reset look like? I would love to hear about it in the comments.

History of Quilling

The history isn’t very long, but provides you with insights on how and why quilling became popular with the rise of paper. Most places that have written about the history of quilling (which I will link to throughout this article), say quilling began as a craft sometime around the 15th century. The North American Quilling Guild believes quilling could have started a few centuries earlier. For example, Spruce Crafts believes it may have started in the 13th century in China, around the time paper was invented.

My Modern Met shares, “it is believed to have been created by French and Italian nuns and used to decorate religious objects in an effort to save money. The filigree was fashioned to simulate carved ivory and wrought iron—two very costly details”. Relatedly, nuns sometimes used gold-gilded paper(trimmed from the edges of books) to make the decorations look like metal. Spruce Crafts reveals quilling resurged in popularity in the 18th century as a "suitable" pastime for the women of the aristocracy. While Quilled Creations explains that this art form was popular in the American colonies. “However, based on the lack of historical samples, quilling seems to have lost its popularity during the late 1800's”.

My guess for the reason the history is so spotty and not many products exists from previous centuries is due to the malleability of paper. This quality of paper is great for quilling, because it can be shaped in so many ways, and inexpensive. However, this feature makes paper products easy to destroy if not handled properly. Today we have more resources to protect work from damage, such as sealing it with a glaze. Alas, this may be why there are not many older examples of quilled pieces of work made from paper. Quilled Wonderland has collected the stories of a few older pieces that survived the times.

Aside: You may notice that the phrase paper ‘filigree’ pops up a lot when exploring the history of quilling. Filigree is decorative or ornamental metal work. The metal flower, as well as the embellish found within the larger petals pictured is similar to shapes and patterns that can be quilled with paper.

Gold filigree intricate work from Portugal. Photo by Ss.analuisa - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=47816424

Quilled paper flowers by All My Quills.

How I Started Quilling

Hi All,

I figured I would share a little bit of encouragement about quilling. The first picture is the first item I quilled. I call it “Joy”. Just kidding. It’s really a collection of shapes that I later realized could be rearranged to make flowers.

When I started quilling it was quite by accident. I was learning how to make greeting cards through various YouTube channels when I stumbled upon a card that was quilled. I thought it was beautiful. I watched the video, learned it was quilling, and looked up what it meant to “quill”. During that search, I learned about Yulia Brodskaya and that was it! I was hooked. I went to work… and created what you see here.

It was okay for a beginner, but nothing close to Yulia’s work (which is not really quilling, but paper art). However, that is okay. You have to learn how to walk before you can run. The first picture illustrates me walking. The second picture (not even two years later; inspired by the Disney Princess, Tiana) shows me moving a bit faster. I am still learning how to run (one day with scissors)! I am a life long learner.

If you stick with this blog, I will take you on my quilling journey, and show you what I know as I go along. The beautiful thing about quilling is that it is really a community activity. Everyone I have met on this quilling journey has been pretty supportive, and wants to teach others, (so we others with whom we can quill ).

My goal is to post once per week. (Maybe more when time allows). My post will always have something to do with quilling or paper arts and crafts. I will share what I am working on, what I am learning, what I reading or watching (as it relates to paper crafts). Feel free to ask questions or share your work! I would love to see what you are quilling, as well as get feedback on my creations.

Well, thank you for your time. I have a few minutes left in the day…just enough time to roll a few more circles before I get ready for tomorrow. Be well friends… and don’t forget to take some time to chill and quill.

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This is the first picture. The picture is comprised of various quilling shapes that have been placed together as flowers, as well as paper hearts.

This quilled picture was inspired by the Disney Princess, Tiana. It is a portrait picture of Tiana in her gown (waist up). She has her her head resting in one hand and is looking up.