The traditional hand-blocking technique, here in France in 1877
Wallpaper is a kind of fabric used to cover and smarten the center walls of homes, offices, and other building; it is one aspect of interior decoration. It is usually sold in rolls and is put onto a wall using wallpaper paste. Wallpapers can come plain as 'lining paper' (so that it can be painted), textured (such as Anaglyptic), with a regular do again example design, or, much less usually today, with a single non-repeating large plan carried over a set of sheet.
Wallpaper print techniques include surface printing, gravure printing, silk screen-printing, rotating printing, and digital printing. Wallpaper is made in long rolls which are hung upright on a wall. Patterned wallpapers are designed so that the pattern "repeats" and pieces cut from the same roll can be hung next to each other so as to carry on the pattern without it being easy to see where the join between two pieces occur. In the case of large complex patterns of images this is usually achieved by starting the second piece middle into the length of the repeat, so that if the pattern going down the roll repeats after 24 inches the next piece to one side is cut from the roll to begin 12 inches down the pattern from the first. The figure of times the pattern repeats flat across a roll does not matter for this purpose. A single pattern can be issued in several different color ways.
History
The main historical method is: hand-painting, slice printing (overall the most common), stenciling, and various types of machine-printing. The first three all date back to before 1700.
Wallpaper, using the printmaking technique of woodcut, gained popularity in Renaissance Europe in the middle of the emerging gentry. The social elite continued to hang large tapestries on the walls of their homes, as they had in the middle Ages. These tapestries added color to the room as well as providing an insulate layer between the stone walls and the room, thus retaining heat in the room. Though, tapestries were extremely luxurious and so only the very rich could afford them. Less well-off members of the elite, unable to buy tapestries due either to prices or wars prevent international trade, turned to wallpaper to brighten up their rooms.
Early wallpaper featured scenes similar to those depicted on tapestries, and large sheets of the paper were sometimes hung loose on the walls, in the style of tapestries, and from time to time pasted as today. Prints were very often pasted to walls, instead of being framed and hung, and the largest sizes of prints, which came in several sheets, were almost certainly mainly intended to be paste to walls. Some important artists made such pieces - notably Albrecht Durer, who worked on both large picture prints and also ornament prints - intended for wall-hanging. The largest picture print was The Triumphal Arch specially made by the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I and completed in 1515. This measured a colossal 3.57 by 2.95 meters, made up of 192 sheets, and was printed in a first edition of 700 copies, intended to be hung in palaces and, in particular, town halls, after hand-coloring.
Very few samples of the earliest repeating prototype wallpapers survive, but there are a large number of old master prints, often in engraving of repeating or repeatable decorative patterns. These are called decoration prints and were intended as models for wallpaper makers, among other uses.
England and France were leaders in European wallpaper manufacturing. Among the earliest known samples is one found on a wall from England and is printed on the back of a London proclamation of 1509. It became very popular in England following Henry VIII's excommunication from the Catholic Church - English aristocracy had always imported tapestries from Flanders and Arras, but Henry VIII's split with the Catholic Church had resulted in a fall in trade with Europe. Without any tapestry manufacturers in England, English gentry and aristocracy alike turned to wallpaper.
During the territory under Oliver Cromwell, the manufacture of wallpaper, seen as a frivolous item by the Puritan government, was halted. Following the Restoration of Charles II, rich people across England began demanding wallpaper again - Cromwell's regime had imposed a boring culture on people, and following his death, wealthy people began purchase comfortable home items which had been banned under the Puritan state.
18th century
Hand-painted Chinese wallpaper showing a funeral procession, made for the European market, c. 1780
In 1712, during the reign of Queen Anne, a wallpaper tax was introduced which was not abolished until 1836. By the mid-eighteenth century, Britain was the leading wallpaper manufacturer in Europe, exporting vast quantity to Europe in addition to selling on the middle-class British market. However this trade was seriously disrupt in 1755 by the Seven Years War and later the Napoleonic Wars, and by a heavy level of duty on imports to France.
In 1748 the British Ambassador to Paris decorated his salon with blue flock wallpaper, which then became very fashionable there. In the 1760s the French manufacturer Jean-Baptist Rebellion hired designers working in silk and tapestry to produce some of the most subtle and luxurious wallpaper ever made. His sky blue wallpaper with fleur-de-lye was used in 1783 on the first balloons by the Montgolfier brothers. The landscape painter Jean-Baptist Pillement discovered in 1763 a method to use fast colors.
Hand-blocked wallpapers like these use hand-carved blocks and by the 18th century designs include panoramic views of antique structural design, exotic landscapes and rustic subjects, as well as repeating patterns of stylized flowers, people and animals.
In 1785 Christophe-Philippe Oberkampf had invented the first machine for printing colored tints on sheets of wallpaper. In 1799 Louis-Nicolas Robert patented a machine to produce continuous lengths of paper, the forerunner of the Fourdrinier machine. This ability to produce continuous lengths of wallpaper now offered the prospect of novel designs and nice tints being widely displayed in drawing rooms across Europe.
Wallpaper manufacturer active in England in the 18th century built-in John Baptist Jacksonand John Sherringham. Among the firms established in 18th century America: J. F. Bum stead & Co. (Boston), William Ponytail (Philadelphia), John Regard (New York.High-quality wallpaper made in China became available from the later part of the 17th century; this was entirely hand painted and very luxurious. It can still be seen in rooms in palaces and grand houses including Nymphenburg Palace, Lazienki Palace, Chatsworth House, Temple News am, Lissan House, and Erddig. It was made up to 1.2 meters wide. English, French and German manufacturers imitated it, usually beginning with a printed outline which was colored in by hand, a technique sometimes also used in later Chinese papers.
19th century France and America
Towards the end of the 18th century the fashion for scenic wallpaper revived in both England and France, leading to some enormous panoramas, like the 1804 20 strip wide panorama, Sauvages de la Mere du Pacifique (Savages of the Pacific), designed by the artist Jean-Gabriel Charvet for the French manufacturer Joseph Dufour et Cie showing the Voyages of Captain Cook. This famous so called "paper point" wallpaper is still in situ in Ham House, Peabody Massachusetts. It was the largest panoramic wallpaper of its time, and marked the burgeoning of a French industry in panoramic wallpapers. Detour realized almost instant success from the sale of these papers and enjoyed a lively trade with America. The Neoclassical style currently in favour worked well in houses of the Federal period with Char vet’s elegant designs. Like most 18th century wallpapers, the panorama was designed to be hung above a dado.
'Savages de la Me Pacifique', panels 1-10 of woodblock printed wallpaper designed by Jean-Gabriel Charvet and manufactured by Joseph Dufour
Beside Joseph Detour ET Cie (1797 - c. 1830) other French manufacturers of panoramic scenic and trompe l'œil wallpapers, Zuber et Cie (1797–present) and Arthur et Robert exported their product across Europe and North America. Zuber ET Cie's c. 1834 design Views of North America hangs in the Diplomatic Reception Room of the White House.
While Joseph Detour ET Cie was shut down in the 1830s, Zuber et Cie still exists and with Cole & Son of England is one the last Western producers of woodblock printed wallpapers. For its production Zuber uses woodblocks out of an archive of more than 100,000 cut in the 19th century which are classified as a "Historical Monument". It offers panoramic sceneries such as "Vie de l'Amérique Nord", "Eldorado Hindustan" or "Isola Bella" and also wallpapers friezes and ceilings as well as hand-printed furnishing fabrics.
Among the firms begun in France in the 19th century: Defuse & Kart.[ In the United States: John Bellerose, Blanchard & Curry, Howell Brothers, Longstreet & Sons, Isaac Pugh in Philadelphia; Bigelow, Hayden & Co. in Massachusetts; Christy & Constant, A. Harwood, R. Prince in New York England
During the Napoleonic Wars, trade between Europe and Britain evaporated, resulting in the gradual decline of the wallpaper industry in Britain. However, the end of the war saw a massive demand in Europe for British goods which had been inaccessible during the wars, including cheap, colorful wallpaper. The development of steam-powered printing presses in Britain in 1813 allowed manufacturers to mass-produce wallpaper, reducing its price and so making it affordable to working-class people. Wallpaper enjoy a huge boom in popularity in the nineteenth century, seen as a cheap and very effective way of brightening up cramped and dark rooms in working-class areas. It became almost the norm in most areas of middle-class homes, but remained comparatively little used in public buildings and offices, with patterns generally being avoided in such locations. In the latter half of the century Incrust and Anaglyptic, not strictly wallpapers became popular competitor, particularly below a dado rail. They could be painted and washed, and were a good deal tougher, though also more expensive.
Wallpaper manufacturing firms established in England in the 19th century included Jeffrey & Co.; Sand Kidd Ltd Light own, Aspin all & Co. John Line & SonsPotter & CoArthur Sanderson & Sons; Townshend & Parker Designers included Owen Jones, William Morris, and Charles Voice. In particular, many 19th century designs by Morris and Co and other Arts and Crafts designers remain in fmanufacture.
20th century
By the early twentieth century, wallpaper had established itself as one of the most popular household items across the Western world. Manufacturers in the USA included Sears designers included Andy Warhol. Wallpaper has gone in and out of fashion since about 1930, but the overall trend has been for wallpaper-type patterned wall coverings to lose ground to plain painted walls.
Historical collections Historical examples of wallpaper are preserved by cultural institution such as the Detaches Tapetenmuseum (Kassel) in Germanythe Muse des Arts Decorates (Paris) and Muse du Peppier Paint (Richie) in Francethe Victoria & Albert in the UKthe Smithsonian's Cooper-Hewitt Historic New England Metropolitan Museum of Art, U.S. National Park Service,[ and Winterthur in the USA.
Types and sizes
In terms of methods of formation, wallpaper types include painted wallpaper, hand-printed woodblock wallpaper, hand-printed stencil wallpaper, machine-printed wallpaper, and flock wallpaper Modern wall coverings are diverse, and what is described as wallpaper may no longer actually be made from paper. Two of the most common factory trimmed sizes of wallpaper are referred to as "American" and "European" rolled goods. American rolled goods are 27 inches by 27 feet (8.2 m) in length. European rolled goods are 21.5 inches wide by 33 feet (10 m) in length. Approx. 60 square feet (5.6 m2). Most wallpaper borders are sold by linear foot and with a wide range of widths therefore square footage is not applicable. Although some may equire trim.
The most common wall covering for residential use and generally the most inexpensive is predated vinyl coated paper, commonly called "strippable" which can be misleading. Cloth backed vinyl is fairly common and durable. Lighter vinyls are easier to handle and hang. Paper backed vinyl’s are generally more expensive, significantly more difficult to hang, and can be found in wider untrimmed widths. Foil wallpaper generally has paper backing and can (remarkably) be up to 36 inches wide, and be very difficult to handle and hang. Textile wallpapers include silks, linens, grass cloths, strings, rattan, and actual frightened leaves. There are acoustical wall carpets to reduce sound. Customized wall coverings are available at high prices and most often have minimum roll orders.
Solid vinyl with a cloth backing is the most common commercial wall covering and comes from the factory as untrimmed at 54 inches about, to be overlapped and double cut by the installer. This same type can be per-trimmed at the factory to 27 inches approximately.
21st century developments
Custom wallpaper printing
New digital inkjet printing technologies using ultraviolet (UV) cured inks are being used for custom wallpaper production. Very small runs can be made, even a single wall. Photographs or digital art are output onto blank wallpaper material. Typical installation are corporate lobbies, restaurants, athletic facilities, and home interiors. This gives a designer the ability to give a space the exact look and feel desired.
High-tech
Wallpaper
New types of wallpaper under development or entering the market in the early 21st century include wallpaper that blocks certain mobile phone and Wi-Fi signals, in the interest of privacy. The wallpaper is coated with a silver ink which forms crystals that block outgoing signals
The Spanish firm Think Big Factory has announced that they are developing wallpaper which also serves as a computer interface, using projectors, webcams, and motion sensors for control. As of 2013, the hardware was complete but only 20 per cent of the software was finished, according to Think Big Factory. Seismic wallpaper
In 2012, Scientists at the Institute of Solid Construction and Construction Material Technology at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology announced that they had developed wallpaper that can help keep a masonry wall from failing in an earthquake. The wallpaper uses a special adhesive which forms a strong bond with the masonry when dry.
Installation \Like paint, wallpaper requires proper surface training before application. Additionally wallpaper is not suitable for all areas. For example, bathroom wallpaper may deteriorate rapidly due to excessive steam. Proper preparation includes the repair of any defects in the drywall or plaster and the removal of loose material or old adhesives. For a better finish with thinner papers and poorer quality walls the wall can be cross-lined (horizontally) with lining paper first .Accurate room measurements (length, width, and height) along with number of window and door openings is essential for ordering wallpaper. Large drops, or repeats, in a pattern can be cut and hung more economically by working from alternating rolls of paper. Paper is sold (with very few exceptions) in double rolls.
Besides conventional installation on interior walls and ceilings, wallpapers have been deployed as decorative covering for hatboxes, bandboxes, books, shelves, and window-shades.
Wallpaper adhesives
Main article: Wallpaper adhesive
Most wallpaper adhesive is starch or methyl cellulose based.
Removal.
Water
The simplest removal option is to brush the paper with water. Water soaks through the paper and saturates the glue, allowing the paper to be peeled off.
This does not work well with non-peel able vinyls, as vinyl is not porous. Nevertheless it is still effective on many modern papers.
A mixture of Water and White Vinegar is effective at dissolving glues. If the wallpaper is scored or sanded with a 20 grit floor sanding pad to scratch the surface solution uptake will be more effective.
Chemical wallpaper stripper
Chemical wallpaper stripper can be purchased at most paint or home improvement stores. It is mixed with warm water or a mixture of warm water and vinegar, and then sprayed onto wall surfaces. Several applications may be required to saturate the existing wallpaper. Perforation can aid in the absorption of the mixture and lead to faster removal. After the mixture has dissolved the wallpaper paste, the wallpaper can be removed easily by pulling at the edges and with the aid of a putty or drywall knife.
Steam
Another method of removal is to apply steam to wallpaper in order to dissolve the wallpaper paste. A wallpaper steamer consists of a reservoir of water, an electric heating element, and a hose to direct the steam at the wallpaper. The steam dissolves the wallpaper paste, allowing the wallpaper to be peeled off. However, care must be taken to prevent damage to the drywall underneath. Sometimes steaming can lead to the breakdown of underlying drywall or plaster, leaving an uneven surface to be repaired.
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