Floral Wallpaper

Choosing floral wallpaper

Where it works

With this many designs, nobody's really asking whether a floral suits the room. The question is how heavy a floral it can take. A bedroom or a landing wants the open, light-ground ones. Dogwood Branch is white blossom on soft sage, and Creamy Dogwood puts it on a dusty slate blue. Dining rooms and studies can carry the dark bouquets. In Midnight Bouquet and Ink Peony the black fills every gap between the blooms, and we think they look best after dark. Kitchens and hallways fall somewhere in the middle, which is where we'd put a cream ground like Sage Poppy or Woodland Songbird.

Picking between the designs

Three things tell one floral from another, and the first is the ground. Peony Bouquet and Rust Chrysanthemum sit on black or burgundy. Sage Poppy and Woodland Songbird have cream or parchment behind them. Teal Daisy is the odd one, on a mottled teal that looks like old plaster. Second, the drawing. Engraved Peony is all woodcut line. Midnight Bouquet has the soft shading of an old-master painting, and Woodland Songbird looks like faded ink with watercolour washed over it. Third, how the flowers are arranged. Pink Tulip comes in mirrored pairs; Burgundy Sunflower is tossed about loosely. Pressed Blooms banks dried flowers up against weathered grey planks, and it's the one floral here that reads as a still life rather than a garden. Our advice? Pick the ground for the room, then the drawing for the furniture.

Related

Leaf-led designs live in botanical wallpaper and the dark ones in moody floral wallpaper. The small cream-ground sprigs are in cottagecore wallpaper. For the small, dense floral that Liberty made famous, there's What is a Liberty floral.