Create your own scene baby!

Natalie Davies – Wallpaper Report.
“To choose a paper for the room you like to inhabit is to make a statement about how you see yourself, and how you want to see the world” Page 7. A Papered History- Timothy Brittain-Catin. I like this quotation as it underlines how personal decorative taste is.
Within the design brief for “Create your own scene, baby!” the idea was very open to interpretation, it didn’t limit us on what we could create and only stipulated that it should be from one of three key themes; Hortus Bontanicus, Toile du jouy or Trompe l’oeil. To begin with it was important for us to gain a wide knowledge of what was out there in terms of wall coverings, past and present. We were asked to compile a research file giving a general idea of different outcomes that were available to us. This helped to open our eyes to the fact that the idea of wall coverings didn’t have to directly mean “wallpaper”. This was brilliant as I never realised the extent of what was possible.
At the time of our set brief, the Whitworth Art Gallery in Manchester had put on the fantastic exhibition “Putting on the Glitz”, showing how metallic finishes have been used over the centuries and how this differs from today. This was a fantastic source of information and highly appealing if your attracted, like myself, to a sparkly item or two! The curator stated that she had been working on bringing an exhibition of this kind to the gallery for many years now and was really proud of how it brings together the glamour and the glitz, along with their techniques, of the past centuries to the present day, I couldn’t agree more.
We were taken on a tour of the Whitworth’s archive collection, which was a treat in itself. What I learnt from the tour has helped me no end in producing my own designs.
The history of wallpapers is a fascinating one, the earliest found wallpapers date back o the late 16th century. They were not the continuous rolls of paper we are use to seeing today, but hand made rag papers in individual sheets, this technique is the reason they have survived the centuries. As contemporary wallpapers are created using a pulp they are not as hardwearing and resilient as the historical ones.
Primarily wallpapers were created for wealthy merchants and the upper classes, for many years they were hung as a status symbol due to the sheer expense it took to create them.“As printing and publishing grew, so did wallpaper”- Page 8. The Cutting Edge of Wallpaper. Paper hangings were popular in the late 17th century, and were often a replacement for fabrics and tapestries. Moving through into the 18th century the possibility of borders on the wallpaper became an appealing option. Designers would at first print these onto the design, but when the opportunity to make more money arose, the borders soon became a separate item! In the middle of the 19th century “England had become a centre of technical innovation in wallpaper manufacturer”- Page 8. The Cutting Edge of Wallpaper. During this time, china and the east opened its doors to the west, due to this; oriental design became a huge trend. A historical Chinese paper was found, where the birds on the design came away from the original item whilst being cleaned. This was a revelation as it was not known this technique was around the date the paper was created. This trend is hugely popular in today's society.
Japanese papers have been discovered displaying a tiled design, showing scenes behind these; pictorial motifs or “Toile du jouy” became a part of the oriental craze, allowing designers in the west more scope on what could be accepted by British public as good design, Trompe l’oeil, making the unreal seem real, became popular in showing large drapes and pillars across the walls. “No longer was a paper chosen simply to look attractive as a pasted object on a wall- from now on, the overall effect of the finished room was considered at the outset.” Page8 The Cutting Edge of Wallpaper. Floral design or “Hortus Bontanicus” was generally acknowledged as a safe option for designers but only when the bloom held realistic characteristics, the boundaries were ready to be pushed in the ninetieth century. Designers wanted to create more stylised, flat designs however the public were not necessarily ready for this, as in its day was considered shocking. This is where the infamous William Morris fits in; his designs were considered a happy medium. I think whether you like the designs or not, Morris has to be given credit for doing what he did best, to the absolute maximum of his potential.
Innovations were constantly occurring around this time, washable (or as Christine told us, “wipeable”) wallpaper became available. Created before this time, but popularised highly was “Flock”, where fibres were added to print glue and then electrostatically charged to make the fibres stand up, giving a regal like finish to the papers. Designs and processes moved on leaps and bounds in the 20th century with popular culture being a factor. One example of this is “Fish Wallpapers” popularised after the war, mainly because people from that point on believed their home would contain a bathroom, which in itself had never been taken for granted before. Wallpaper was now more important than it ever had been, being available to the masses and advertised widely. The wallpapers were often shown behind a certain scene and people often believed what they saw, believing they could have the lifestyle portrayed in that image.
Taking the information gained from our visit and my research file, I now had the knowledge I needed to select which area I wanted to look at and the direction I could take my work. I was always drawn to naturalistic designs, so “Hortus Bontanicus” was an obvious starting point for my ideas. I was attracted to the slightly fantasised designs I collected in my research file, images such as “Dryads” 2005 by Rinzen really intrigued me and I wondered if I could create something that had a similar feel to it.
In the March edition of House and Garden, a specialists profile on the designer Michael Angrove was featured. I loved his work! He scans plants and flowers into the computer; they are then meticulously cut away from the white background, he then creates a design where he says “It must look as real as possible”, he then adds animals or insects. “Every design must have a hidden creature. I love the idea of a client having a wall covering for many years before discovering it”. This is just a lovely concept, one that makes me want to own one of his designs.
I decided I like the idea of “The Secret Garden”, a design with a somewhat surrealistic feel to it. My initial idea was to add childlike elements to my designs; I looked at carousels as I thought a traditional fairground image may have appealing aesthetics, as this image didn’t correlate as easily as I’d imagined, a more overgrown feel might have worked better. Through combining these images with other parts of my design I didn’t feel they were necessary in conveying the idea I wanted to portray.
I loved the “Putting on the Glitz” exhibition and wanted to incorporate this into my work. Through testing the foils, I found that photocopied images worked really well, especially when using silk flowers; the textures they produced were really interesting. Through cutting out my images I found that they gave a very bold design, in that the “bloom” became very prominent in my work. I thought it would be an interesting idea to put these images onto a screen and see how the foil would look, when the image it was being pressed onto was of a grainy, unnatural quality. I decided that I would use floral material as I didn’t want a realistic look to the end piece. The holographic foil I felt worked really well on the designs and gave the look I wanted. I used Ivy throughout my work, but wanted an element to my piece that was of a surreal nature, this is where the idea of using pearls came in. I felt they had a vine like characteristic and could quite easily work, with buds and flowers sprouting from them. After combining them with my other elements I thought the idea worked well. Throughout the project I have had a lot of ideas that I wished to include or felt they may have an interesting outcome, because of this I approached this project differently and did not reject my initial ideas straight away. One of these was including knit somehow in my design, my resolution to how to do this was to have it displayed in paper forms upon my ivy leaves. I feel through doing this I have ended up with a design idea that could be used possibly not just on a feature wall but ‘growing’ in different areas of the home. “The Secret Garden” was the idea for my piece and in my opinion the way my design looks captures the magical, surreal look I feel capture the essence of this.
Maybe on some level looking back on the first quote, this is how I want to see the world.