How to Press Sweet Bay Leaves for Lasting Botanical Displays

Why Sweet Bay Earns a Place in a Pressing Project

Sweet bay (Laurus nobilis) is an evergreen shrub or small tree grown for its stiff, glossy, aromatic leaves. Most cooks know the dried leaf from soups and stews, but the same leaves make unusually good pressed material: they hold a clean oval outline, keep their midrib and side veins, and darken to a soft olive or antique green rather than turning papery and brown. Because a mature bay plant produces leaves year-round, you can harvest a few at a time without stripping the shrub, which makes bay one of the easiest subjects for a first serious leaf-pressing project.

The aim here is a specific, achievable result: a small framed or mounted set of pressed bay leaves that looks deliberate rather than improvised. Bay is more demanding than a fern frond because it is thick and leathery. A leaf pressed flat in a book overnight will usually wrinkle, dry unevenly or mold before it is dry. The project works when you match the harvest, the pressing pressure and the drying time to that thickness.

Choosing and Harvesting Leaves

Pick leaves that show the character you want to keep. Young, soft leaves at the tips of a shoot shrink more in the press and can distort; fully expanded leaves from the previous season's growth press cleaner and hold their scent longer. Choose healthy leaves with an intact edge and no dark spotting, slug damage or powdery coating. A slight variation in size is fine and gives a mounted set natural rhythm.

Harvest with sharp snips, taking a few leaves from different parts of the shrub rather than stripping one branch. Cut with a short stub of stem attached — about 5 mm to 1 cm — because the stem gives you something to align and glue later, and it helps the leaf dry without curling at the base. Rinse the leaves if they are dusty, then blot them thoroughly. Surface water trapped in a press is a common cause of staining and mold.

• Best material: mature, dark-green, unblemished leaves from established growth.
• Handle gently: bay bruises dark if crushed, and the bruise stays visible after drying.
• Keep the bounty modest: press only what you can process within a day or two of picking.

Setting Up the Press

A dedicated flower press gives you even, adjustable pressure, which matters for leathery leaves. A simple wooden press with two boards and four bolts works well; you turn the wing nuts as the leaves lose moisture to maintain contact. A thick book under weight can press bay, but the pressure is uneven and hard to adjust, and the leaf often curls at the edges as the pages settle. If you plan to press bay every year, a press with a stack of absorbent paper or card is the better investment.

Layering is the part that decides success:

• Blotting paper or newsprint directly against each leaf, to draw moisture away.
• Card or corrugated sheet between layers, so air can move and moisture escapes rather than sitting in the stack.
• Two or three layers of absorbent paper on the top and bottom of the whole stack.

Arrange the leaves face-down, flat, with no overlaps and enough margin that the edges are not crushed. A plant press with blotting-paper refills or a pack of acid-free pressing card is worth buying because the paper does real work: it wicks moisture, keeps the leaf from sticking to the boards and prevents the brown ghosting that shows up on recycled or damp paper.

The Method, Step by Step

1. Pre-shape the leaf

Place each bay leaf on its blotting sheet and smooth it with a fingertip from the midrib outward. Do not bend the leaf to flatten it; if the leaf is stiff and refuses to sit flat, leave it a few minutes in a warm room first. A leaf that is warm and pliable presses without creasing.

2. Build the stack and close the press

Alternate leaf-and-blotter layers with cards, keeping the stack square. Close the boards and tighten the bolts evenly until the leaves are held firmly but not crushed. A bay leaf should feel like a firm handshake through the paper — you are holding it still, not squashing it.

3. Change the paper early and often

For the first three or four days, open the press daily and swap the damp blotting paper for dry. Bay releases moisture slowly, and this early stage is when mold appears if the paper stays wet. After the first week, check every few days. Expect two to four weeks to full dryness depending on humidity and leaf thickness; a dry leaf is rigid, lighter in color and makes a faint rustle rather than bending.

4. Keep notes

A small label on each layer with the harvest date, leaf position and drying time turns each pressing into useful reference material. Over a couple of seasons you will know which leaves on your plant press best and how long your own conditions take.

Mounting and Displaying the Finished Leaves

Pressed bay has a quiet, archival look: soft olive-green leaves with pale veins, best displayed on off-white or warm-grey paper. Arrange three to seven leaves in a loose fan or a single vertical line, with the stems aligned and the largest leaf as the anchor. Fix them with small dots of acid-free glue or narrow strips of linen tape over the stem only, so the blade stays free and its texture shows.

For a clean finish, use a mounting board and a simple frame with a mat. A card-stock herbarium sheet works as well and is easier to label with the species name, harvest date and garden source — a format that suits the botanical character of bay better than a tight decorative frame. Keep finished pieces out of direct sun, which fades the green, and away from damp kitchens; pressed bay is dry botanical material, not a preserved food product, so it belongs with your craft and herbarium projects rather than back in the spice jar.

What Makes the Project Worth Repeating

The value of pressing sweet bay is that it links a plant you already grow for the kitchen to a lasting visual record of its leaves. A single shrub can supply a season of small projects, and the same press handles other aromatic evergreens — rosemary, sage, olive — with the same logic: harvest mature leaves, press them with absorbent layers, change the paper early and wait for full dryness. Once the routine is set, a bay pressing becomes a low-effort way to build a collection of your own garden's foliage, one leaf at a time.