Gentle Readers, I know that some of you are hesitant to use wallpaper. It’s my life’s work to change that. I spread joy. Wallpaper = joy. Ergo…you get it.
Let’s just imagine for a second that you’re 100% comfortable using wallpaper — at least in a powder room — and are considering the next step in your decorating “journey.”
The next step, of course, is more wallpaper.
For a recent article in Vogue, I was asked how one goes about mixing wallpapers, whether that’s putting different wallpapers in adjacent rooms or installing 2 wallpapers in the same room. Talk about BOLD!
I’ve done at least one TikTok and a blog post about mixing patterns. Bottom line: Mix the motif, mix the scale, make color the throughline.
Above, we installed a medium-scale geometric pattern with an oversized quasi-floral in the same space. (That’s Deconstructed Stripe by Schumacher on the left and Totem Damask by Timorous Beasties on the right.) Crisp white is the common denominator.
To get us grounded, here’s a history nugget. Wallpaper was invented in China around 200 BCE and made its way to Europe in the 12th century. France and England starting producing it in the 1500s. Thanks in large part to the British Arts & Crafts designer William Morris, by the mid-19th century, wallpaper was practically de rigeur across Europe.
Morris and those Victorians set wallpaper on fire, figuratively speaking. For them, it wasn’t enough to use a single wallpaper in a room; they routinely installed one paper on the lower portion of a wall (the dado), another above it, and a wallpaper border just under the crown moulding. Bonus points were earned by wallpapering the ceiling as well. (Never mind that much of the wallpaper at that time — fabric, too — was made with arsenic. There are worse ways to go, I suppose.)
Laura Ashley re-popularized wallpaper on wallpaper in the 1970s when she expanded her business into home furnishings. Pattern, pattern everywhere: there are two wallpapers plus a border in the picture below. For many Americans (and others, I assume), Laura Ashley defined English country style, but some of us still have a hangover from her sickly sweet, floral-forward spaces.
But that was then, Gentle Readers! This is now! Placing two wallpapers next to or near each other can feel fresh and modern. It’s a strategic, thoughtful way to make a space really, really special. (And a terrific hack if you don’t have a huge art collection.) Below, a smallish geometric pattern next to a larger floral, with blue in common.
Textured grasscloth pairs beautifully next to patterned wallpaper, either in the same room…
…or in rooms next to each other.
I used to hesitate before putting patterned wallpaper in room after room. No longer! This is my dining room:
And through that navy blue door on the left is our powder room:
It’s hard to justify, but I suppose a people-filled, scenic wallpaper next to a large floral counts as mixing motifs. Right?
Here’s another room-by-room wallpaper progression. You walk into my client’s foyer,
and from there you can see the kitchen.
You go from dark geometric to quasi floral, which works even though both scales are large. If the colorful wallpaper — Fruit Looters by Timorous Beasties — didn’t have black in it, this juxtaposition wouldn’t have worked as well.
From THERE, the kitchen, you go into the dining room, which is has gold silk wallcovering. It isn’t patterned, just textured, muted, soft…it’s so much richer and more interesting than paint, and, as I hope you agree, it looks fantastic in the context of the other wallcoverings.
This was a fun post to write, because I don’t think this way when I’m actually designing: “Mix the motif, mix the scale, make color the throughline.” I just do things, and then I cross my fingers that I followed my own rules. (I create the rules by working backwards anyway: I look at what I’ve done time and time again and ask myself why it worked.)
I know wallpaper is in your future, Gentle Readers. Call me if you need encouragement.
Annie Elliott Design is based in Washington, D.C., but we also love working in NYC and on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. We’re now scheduling projects for fall. Please contact us to discuss.