Rosemary Milner- Project Report

For the project report I am going to talk, in depth, about the theme of the brief and the historical background of wallpaper. I will discuss how the visits to galleries and Stately homes were influential within the project report in deciphering the historical context of wallpaper. For example the Whitworth Gallery and Temple Newsam gave a real insight into the History of some wallpaper traditions and the concepts behind them. I will also talk about my own style of work and how that has developed throughout this project. I am going to discuss my inspiration for my final designs and how I re-invented wallpaper traditions with my own wall covering.

Within my project of wall coverings I decided to focus mainly on the Botanical/Floral aspect of wallpapers. In wallpaper History flowers are an obvious choice for motifs in textiles because of their simplicity and because of the idea that people wanted to bring the beauty of the natural world into their homes. Designers and artists have always relied on the decorative possibilities of flowers and foliage, some motifs not belonging to a particular species of flower to give your imagination full range.
From earliest history it is evident that floral in fashion and interior have never gone out of style. William Morris’ wallpaper/fabrics for example, are largely based on the botanical concept and have influenced many designers, including Liberties London, to produce designs on the floral concept.
Wallpaper has, in general, been thought of as a background cover background cover rather than foreground in decoration. However it does play a vital role in the theme of the room and the choices for other aspects e.g. furnishings. Exempt from this rule would be the Chinese Papers and the early 19th French scenic decorations, because of their lavish designs they are very much centre pieces rather than backgrounds. When researching the history of wallpapers there is a distinctive influence from the textiles medium. For example some of the earliest wall coverings were made from fabrics. Wall hangings of various kinds are where paper hangings have stemmed from, so it is not surprising that the earliest and most consistent influence of wallpaper design has come from textiles.
Within the 16th and early 17th century lining papers and wallpapers were direct printed copies pf the embroidery, the various stitches and textures were carefully reproduced on paper using cross-hatched line. From this basic idea of using textiles as a basis for wallpaper I have created my own wall covering using techniques and influences from the textile range. In particular embroidery became a huge aspect of my work. I wanted to bring in the texture element as a concept of my design, almost making the wallpaper interactive. It invites you to touch the wall instead of just looking at it. I wanted to create a different aspect of line which is why I used the freehand embroidery as the basis for my design.

Fabric examples from whitworth


Other noticeable inspirations for my project have been the visits to the Whitworth Gallery in Manchester and Temple Newsam in Leeds. The Whitworth Gallery in particular held some truly luxurious wallpapers ranging from the 16th century to the present day. The Archives at the Whitworth helped with my project report because I learnt a lot about the history of some of the papers and how they fit in context e.g. within the home. For example some of the floral papers dated 1895-1900, in the late Victorian era, were made for high ceiling rooms and the rich colours on some of the papers were used in the billiard and dining rooms. Temple Newsam was also hugely inspirational because it shows the traditional wallpapers in context and how they were presented in each room.

Crimson flock paper, Chinese wallpaper, Crimson flock wallpaper-pomegranate green TEMPLE NEWSAM

Within my research for this project I have noticed how traditions have repeated themselves in terms of the design for wallpapers. I have realised that many new designers today have taken old traditions, themes and re-invented them to suit modern popular culture. William Morris in particular is obviously a key influence within the modern day due to his original detailed designs. Designers such as Marimekko have taken Morris’ original concept of detailed floral and reproduced it as a contemporary wall covering.

I believe William Morris has been particularly inspirational within my project due to the fact I have used Botanical as a theme and branched from there. I wanted my project to be different and re-inventive so I used a combination of imagery within my work. I produced observations of birds, wild flowers and odd antiques such as clocks, typewriters and stamps. I feel this combination of imagery is how I have re-invented the concept of floral wall coverings and stamped my own personal style on it.

This project ahs helped me develop my own style through the use of observational studies. The use of my observational drawings of wild flowers, birds etc was a spring board for the whole concept of my project and really defined my style individually.
Other designers that have helped with the development of my project and with the techniques are Lisa Bengtsson, Claire Cole and Deborah Bowness. Claire Cole in particular was inspirational because of her use of recycled wallpapers. She uses the same concept of using collected papers and recreating them as her own work. Cole also uses the reverse appliqué technique with naïve household imagery. This is what inspired my object imagery along with my observations of wild flowers. The key techniques for my final wall coverings were reverse appliqué, using freehand embroidery and the use of collage. The combination of all these methods was very successful in my final design work.

During this project I have learnt new methods to use in my work. The Gesso technique was particularly useful in this project. However it was a time consuming process as it uses the idea of layering images and using a special liquid substance onto wood. There were many variations of using Gesso, but I decided to use photocopies of my initial observations and incorporate them into the technique. I think this was successful due to the fact it creates a used, vintage look which is how I wanted my wall coverings to be conveyed.

Another useful technique I learnt within this project is flocking and foiling. This is a method using screen printing as a basis then heat transfer using the foils and the flocking paper. Although this technique wasn’t key in my project, I will definitely use it in future because wallpaper design often uses this approach.

The main printing method I used for this project was paper screen printing. This was a very successful approach to my work as it created the perfect background for my vintage theme. I was then able to build on the prints using the collage and reverse appliqué techniques. These were the final methods I used for my wall coverings and the overall effect was quite successful. The only aspect I would change would be the use of the laser cutter. I would have preferred to have used more of this machine in my work because it worked quite well in the experimental stage of my project.