A Primer on Wallpaper: Where it Came From and is it Coming Back?

By Bill Primavera

Through the many years of being the Home Guru, I have written about wallpaper several times. Maybe it’s because I love it so.

And maybe I love it so because I feel that I am such an expert at applying it. Nobody can beat me technically at coordinating wallpaper patterns to the interior architectural features they must accommodate.

There is another reason that I love it: It can hide a thousand sins.

I used to work many years ago with a woman who always wore a hat, indoors and out, saying that “a hat hides a thousand sins.” That applies to wallpaper as well.

Prior to moving to Trump Park in Shrub Oak when it was spanking new and its wall surfaces were spanking smooth (they still are), I had always lived in older homes, even antique homes, where old walls offered a thousand sins to hide. I’m not so sure that I don’t miss camouflaging all of those sins.

Maybe it’s a sentimental thing. One of my earliest memories was my dad applying wallpaper that was embossed to our living room in our row home in Philadelphia. I delighted in running my little fingers along the textured surface of the paper. (I’m sure, leaving fingerprints in the process.)

So where did wallpaper come from? The Chinese have the honor of inventing wallpaper. They are said to have pasted rice papers on to walls as far back as the Qin dynasty, a couple of hundred years before Christ. Smoother linen fibers later replaced rice, so that painting and printing on paper became possible.

The first Chinese wallpapers were of birds, flowers and landscapes painted on that rice paper.

Starting in the 16^th century, the early wall papers were used to decorate the insides of cupboards and smaller rooms in merchants’ houses rather than the grand houses of the aristocracy. But by the beginning of the 20^th century, it was being used everywhere – in hallways, kitchens, bathrooms and bedrooms and was popular in both the wealthiest and poorest homes.

Yet, it was this very popularity that led to wallpaper being regarded as the poor relative of the decorative arts.

In my life as a public relations guy promoting restaurants, I once represented a low-priced steakhouse in New York City that prided itself on its interior décor. However, it was in questionable taste, even oppressive, featuring a heavily flocked red wallpaper. (Flock wallpaper is paper that features a pattern or design which mimics the look of velvet. It creates a heavy-enough effect to support digging into a big, juicy steak.)

I find that wallpapers can limit what else is hung on the walls. A plain painted wall can more readily serve as the ground for prints, paintings and other hangings.

It is amusing to note that Oscar Wilde, a literary figure of great wit, was afforded one of his greatest quotes by wallpaper, attributed to him on his deathbed: “This wallpaper and I are fighting a duel to the death. Either it goes or I do.” I guess it was bad enough that he went first.

Recently, I read somewhere that wallpaper was poised for a comeback. Was it in The New York Times? No matter, I don’t believe it.

Bill Primavera is a residential and commercial realtor associated with William Raveis Realty, as well as a publicist and journalist writing regularly as The Home Guru. For questions about home maintenance or to buy or sell a home, he can be e-mailed at williamjprimavera@gmail.com or call directly at 914-522-2076.

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