How to Make Paper-Wrapped Microscope Slide Preparations

Wrapping prepared microscope slides in ornamental paper first served as a practical way to hold down the coverglass to the slide prior to the introduction of Canada Balsam mounting medium. This practice continued for many decades after the invention of Canada Balsam, due to its aesthetic appeal. The unique look and feel of a paper-wrapped microscope slide led me to try wrapping some of my own.

Where to Start?

Thomas Davies’ book “The Preparation and Mounting of Microscopic Objects” begins with the basics of microscope slide preparation—the decision of whether to use a round or square coverglass. Davies chooses the more expensive round coverglass over the cheaper square variety, but he says it depends if the final slide preparation will be wrapped in ornamental paper:

“If appearances, however, is cared for at all, the circles look much neater upon the slides when not covered with ornamental papers; but if these last are (as will be shortly described) the squares are equally serviceable.”

I agree with Davies on this point. The best-looking (non-paper-wrapped) microscope slide preparations are those which use a round coverglass. However, wrapping a microscope slide in ornamental paper, featuring a round cut-out cover paper placed over a square coverglass, accomplishes the same aesthetic.

The vintage paper-wrapped microscope slide from the Brooks Collection of Antique Microscopes, pictured above, shows the outline of the square coverglass beneath the ornamental paper. Davies goes on to explain how to wrap a microscope slide in paper:

“If ornamental papers are preferred, a small circle must be cut out from the centre a little less than the thin glass which covers the object. Another piece of colored paper is made of the same size, and a similar circle taken from its centre also, or both may be cut at the same time. The slide is then covered round the edges with paper of any plain colour, so that it may extend about one-eighth of an inch over the glass on every side.”

While Davies’ description is accurate, I think an illustration would be helpful, especially for a beginner such as myself.

Show, Don’t Tell

A good set of written and visual instructions can be found in John H. Martins’ book “A Manual of Microscopic Mounting: With Notes on the Collection and Examination of Objects”, published in 1872. Notice Martins uses a square coverglass in the illustrations below.

“A piece of paper 3 ½ inches by 1 ½ inches is cut from a sheet of coloured red on one side and gummed on the other…a hole is then punched in the exact centre (see Fig. 43).“

Martins continues describing his step-by-step process referring the reader to the above illustration:

“A wet brush is then passed over the gummed surface, and the slide laid upon it, so that the hole may come exactly on the centre of the thin glass, only on the opposite side; then, with a sharp pair of scissors, cut the paper as represented in the dotted line, Fig. 43;”

“The gummed surface must then be moistened, and the edges folded over the glass slip very tightly, as shown in Fig.44.”

“After all four edges are brought over, the ornamental cover must have its gummed surface moistened with a brush, and laid so its hole, which has been previously punched out, shall be exactly in the centre of the slide…round or oval labels of white gummed paper must then be placed at the top and bottom of the slide.”

Notice Martins’ slide wrapping process starts underneath the microscope slide from the bottom and is finishing with an ornamental cover (top) paper. This will be important when considering a second microscope slide wrapping technique used by Joseph Bourgogne.

Taking a Perfect Circle

Davies’ description calls for “taking a circle” from the center portions of gummed paper to be used to wrap the microscope slides. One of the easiest ways to make a uniform round opening in paper is with a scrapbooking hole punch.

This punch works great for the top ornamental paper but lacks the reach needed to take a circle from the wider bottom paper.

A different way of taking a circle uses a hollow punch typically meant for leather crafting applications. This method was introduced to me by Oliver Kim. Kim walks viewers through his trial and error process of paper-wrapping microscope slides on his YouTube channel Microbehunter, Episode 041: “How to Make a Microscope Slide More Durable”.

Kim uses a single sixteen-millimeter hollow punch. I wanted the option of creating a variety of different cutout sizes, so I purchased a 12-piece set of hollow punches. The cost of the set wasn’t much more than purchasing a single punch. With my hollow punches in hand, it was time to take some circles, but first I had to make a template for what would become the bottom and cover papers for my slides.

Making the Bottom Papers

In Kim’s video, he demonstrates making patterns first by hand, and then replicating the pattern using Microsoft PowerPoint. Below is my mash-up approach of recreating Martins’ bottom paper template using PowerPoint.

I found it difficult to draw the corner cutouts of Martins’ bottom paper template using the Freeform tool in PowerPoint, so I opted for a series of simple shapes and single lines to mimic the cutouts for my bottom paper template. Below are the dimensions of each shape used to create my bottom paper template. The last step was to overlay a circle image for a cutout guide.

Bottom Paper Shape Dimensions:

• Rectangle: H: 1.79”, W: 4.43”
• Circle: H: 0.76”, W: 0.76”
• Arrows: H: 0.2”, W: 0.4”

As a timesaver, I electronically snipped the image of my bottom paper template and pasted the image multiple times to fill up an entire PowerPoint slide. The idea is to have your entire page filled when you eventually print the images on the gummed paper.

To make sure my bottom papers would fit the dimensions of a standard microscope slide, I first printed them on less expensive office paper. I cut the bottom papers to size by removing the series of simple shapes from the template. The image below shows my sequence of cuts.

Using the 5/8” hollow punch and striking it with a hammer, I removed the center portion of the bottom paper as illustrated below.

After cutting the bottom papers and taking a circle, I placed them underneath some prepared microscope slides to see how well they fit. Again, using cheaper office paper first to do a rough fit is a good idea prior to printing on more expensive gummed paper.

The above image shows my bottom papers underneath two prepared microscope slides. The top microscope slide preparation was made using an 18 × 18 mm square coverglass, the other using a 22 × 22 mm square coverglass (bottom). Using the smaller 18 × 18 mm coverglass allows less room for alignment errors. In both cases, my trial run of bottom papers fit well. It was time to create the ornamental top papers.

Making Ornamental Cover Papers

My goal was to mimic the dramatic designs of the cover papers sold by the opticians during the Victorian era. Pictured below are some vintage pre-punched top papers from the mid-1800s.

For something visually interesting I purchased a collection of downloadable digital files called “All the Marbles” from Mad Paper Crush. I thought the marbled designs had a microscopical feel to them. I made the cover papers using PowerPoint and filled in the rectangle shape with the marbled designs. I then added the same circle cutout used for the bottom paper to the cover paper template.

Cover Paper Dimensions:

• Rectangle: H: 1.23”, W: 3.65”
• Circle: H: 0.76”, W: 0.76”

Printing on Gummed Paper

I found two gummed paper sources, one from Etsy, which offers small quantities of gummed paper (ten sheets) and the other from Steadfast Paper, offering larger quantities (500 sheets). Each gummed paper sheet has a water-activated adhesive on one side.

Again, to get the most out of each sheet of gummed paper, I filled the entire PowerPoint slide layout with an equal number of images of the cover papers and bottom papers. I even squeezed in a few vintage labels, also from Mad Paper Crush.

After cutting out the images, water is applied to the gummed side of the paper using an artist’s paint brush. The water-activated gummed adhesive sets up fast, so any alignment adjustments must be done quickly. The finished paper-wrapped microscope slides had the look and feel of the those produced during the Victorian era.

Satisfied with my newly-acquired microscope slide wrapping skills, I wanted to level up and try emulating the master of the craft, Joseph Bourgogne.

The Bourgogne Method

In the Victorian era, there were many microscope slide preparers who specialized in paper wrapped microscope slides, but the agreed upon master was Joseph Bourgogne. His advertised “First Choice” paper-wrapped microscope slides like the one pictured below, in my opinion, are suitable for framing.

It’s All About the Middle Paper

Bourgogne’s slide wrapping method starts with applying a middle paper onto the top surface of the slide (coverglass side) and then wrapping the edges down around the underside of the microscope slide. This approach is opposite from the Martins method, which starts from beneath the slide, as described earlier. The middle paper carries the specimen’s name and number, which is revealed by taking two additional circles from the cover paper. A third bottom paper finishes off the slide. Without a published template of a Bourgogne middle paper, I made my own design based on observations of the vintage Bourgogne slide.

On the backside of the vintage Bourgogne slide there are no miter cuts, but instead the corners have straight folds. Keeping with the idea of folding rather than mitering the middle paper, I rounded off the corners of my middle paper design.

Bourgogne also varied the diameters of the cover paper’s circles, creating a visually-interesting presentation. The hollow punch dimensions for the two additional circles for the cover paper are ½” (far left) and 3/8” (far right).

Below are the dimensions of each shape I used in my Bourgogne PowerPoint template.

The Bourgogne PowerPoint Template Dimensions:

• Cover Paper: H: 1.23”, W: 3.65”
• Middle Paper: H: 1.86”, W: 4.33”
• Bottom Paper: H: 1.23”, W: 4.43”
• Middle Circles: H: 0.76”, W: 0.76”
• Cover Paper, Left Circle: H: 0.65”, W: 0.65”
• Cover Paper, Right Circle: H: 0.5”, W: 0.5”

Let’s Wrap This Up

Once you have established your PowerPoint template, the design choices are endless. For some of my Bourgogne-inspired slides, I made cover papers featuring optical properties related to polarized light microscopy. I even tried to mimic the look of the old school handwriting of Bourgogne’s slides by experimenting with different fonts and such.

The Bourgogne method is more labor intensive, but the result is what sets his paper-wrapped microscope slides apart from his competitors. Whichever template you decide to follow, both elevate the appearance of your microscope slide preparations at a reasonable cost.