It's best to use an old pot.
You will need a large pot in which to cook the plant material. The plant material is boiled in an alkaline solution to break down the non-fibrous material and help separate individual fibers.
If you plan on making paper often, it is wise to invest in a stainless steel pot. Cheaper aluminum pots can be used, but the caustic additive used will eventually erode the aluminum.
Use whatever is handy, heavy, disposable, and easy to hold.
A mallet or other piece of wood will be needed to mash the cooked fiber into a pulp. There's really no need to go out and buy a mallet until you're really hooked on papermaking. You can use a section of a 2x4, a heavy stick, a kiddie baseball bat, or anything that is heavy enough to mash the fiber and that is comfortable to handle.
This strainer was made from plastic screen wrapped over the front grill of a fan.
You will need a large strainer in which to rinse your fiber and pulp. Any strainer will do, but it has to be large. The strainer at left was made by wrapping plastic screen over the grill of a house fan and securing it with wire. The strainer has to be large enough to allow you to rinse the cooked fiber very well after you have drained it.
A large container is needed to hold the fiber and water.
When you get to the point where you will be forming your sheets of paper, you will need a large container in which to put the water, fiber, and formation aid. This mixture is called the 'slurry.' The container should be at least one foot deep, two feet wide and two feet long.
The mold and deckle are the only tools unique to the process.
The mold and deckle are perhaps the most important tools used as they are what you actually form the paper on. The mold is a frame with screen stretched tightly across it and glued and/or stapled to the frame. This allows the water to flow through while trapping the fiber. The deckle is a frame the same size as the mold, but with no screen. It sits on top of the mold and helps to capture the fiber. Without the deckle, the fiber would simply flow off the sides of the mold.
Felt is used to dry the paper on. Here is some felt shown with other tools.
You will need many pieces of felt on which to place your sheets of paper for drying. Felt is used because it allows the paper to be easily lifted when it is dry; the fibers to not bond with the felt as well as they do with other materials.