Peeling black skin, Gassan paper

The skin of the steamed mulberry is easily pealed off by hand. Since this needs to be done before the branches cool, local people and college students come to help out with the work. The pealed skin is dried in bundles. Then, the dried paper mulberry skin is soaked in water again and the surface skin is shaved off using a knife. Paper mulberry that still has the outer skin is called “black skin” (kurokawa) and the stripped paper mulberry inner skin is called white skin (shirokawa). The shirokawa is then dried. This process is still done with the help of the Iwanesawa locals.