I Make Whimsical Papercuts With Characters That Will Make You Smile

Designing papercut characters can take a lot of thought, much more than making a sketch and then having it painted. That’s because a papercut is in sharp contrast to it’s background, hence it’s quicker to note any faults.

My name is Shalinee Laval, and I am the creator behind Tristan’s Paper Stories. I live in France, and I have been papercutting since 2014. Childhood memories of reading story books of enchanted woods, and funny animal characters always held a special place for me. I convert my happy memories into papercut characters. Every personality has a positive quality, with emotions like hope, optimism and happiness. A terrier offering love balloons, a Parisian elephant cycling home, a whale with her little one swimming in outer space, a treehouse in lush surroundings, these are some of my characters that will enchant you with their sweetness, just as it does for me.

The process of my papercuts is simple. I design on a 120gsm paper with a pencil. When I am happy with what I have, I place the paper on a cutting mat, and with a scalpel, cut out my figures. The next step is having them framed. I frame in a way that allows the shadows of my papercuts to fall at the back of the frame. I also take custom requests, whether it is to add a name or to design an entire character.

It takes me a minimum of a week to be more than satisfied with my final design of the character. For human characters, details like the nose, lips and fingers are tricky parts to cut out. I add and subtract any other details as I see fit.

More info: Etsy