Purple Wallpaper

Choosing purple wallpaper

Where it works

Purple shifts a lot with the light, so look at the window before you look at the samples. A north-facing room pulls lilac toward gray, which is lovely if you want calm and a little flat if you don't. Give the pale designs some sun: Lilac Magnolia, white stars and cupped pink flowers on a cool lilac ground, or Gilded Dogwood beside cane and pale oak in a nursery. The deep plums work the other way round. They wake up after dark. Picture Plum Lotus in a dining room with the candles lit, the gold on each petal catching while the plum sinks back, or Gilded Plum wrapped around a reading nook. Walnut and brass look right next to them, and so does a dark green on the trim.

Picking between the designs

Ask yourself how much purple you actually want. In some designs it's an accent: Mauve Poppy leaves cream showing between its stems, and Mauve Artichoke stays in fine engraved line (it's the one for a kitchen). Others go all in. Lavender Sweep has no ground showing at all, just loaded brushstrokes running from lilac to inky navy with gold flicked between them. Then there's the loud end, where purple meets brighter colors: Cabbage Flower's magenta rosettes on lavender, the tilted bands of Diagonal Plaid, the four tigers prowling through Tiger Magnolia Mural. Can't decide? Tape two samples up near the window and leave them for a day. You'll know by dusk.

Related

The dusty mauves mostly sit in pink wallpaper too. Plum Lotus and Gilded Plum carry on in gold wallpaper, and the darkest, candlelit designs are in moody floral wallpaper.