Freshly floral forever

If there’s one decorating motif that has survived the decades, or in fact the centuries, it’s the flower. Whether painterly and whimsical, or bold and abstract, floral wallpapers and fabrics just keep on keeping on. We love them.

Another decorating detail stalwart is the crane – which graces the wallpaper in this hallway, flitting from branch to flower. Used in Japanese decor, in particular, the the crane symbolises beauty, harmony, and grace. It represents positive change – it’s associated with the New Year in various cultures – and is a strong symbol of success and good fortune. Who wouldn’t want pictures of them on the wall?

As each year’s fashion and tastes roll around, style influences are often borrowed from the past and reinterpreted for the here and now – and into the future. They’re refreshed and reinvigorated so that this decade’s styles have a whole new personality than the original. For example, a classic English county look with a mix of patterns such as delicate florals, plaids and stripes might be updated with fresher colours and pretty Resene coloured walls – just like this elegantly updated Victoriana look with its whimsical wallpaper and dado-height wall panelling – a joyful example of Grandma chic. Adding some unexpected elements, such as a sheepskin and a basket pendant lampshade, gives a touch of quirk to the space. One component of any room that can help bring disparate items and items together is paint colour. In this case it’s another classic that has survived the decades – Resene Spanish White.

There’s a reason it has been so popular over the years. Resene describes it as “a complexity of hues of yellow oxide, orange, green and raw umber that will work well with most colourways”. It has a delicious mutable creamy feel and comes in a number of strengths – Resene Triple Spanish White is quite beige while Resene Eighth Spanish White is a white with a whisper of warmth.

In this hallway it’s used as Resene Spanish White on the lower walls, as well as on the elegant floor design where a border of Resene Double Spanish White is painted on top of Resene Quarter Spanish White.

The hero of the room, however, is this pretty wallpaper, Resene Wallpaper Collection 220482, in which cranes and pheasants perch amongst flowers and blossoming tree branches. It all plays out with a combination of vintage shades such as petal pink, soft yellow and apricots and faded greens against a background of cool grey. It’s a wallpaper design that will be a spring in your step and an injection of springy loveliness into the room.

You can use the colours in the wallpaper to inspire painted accents in the room, for example dusky mid green Resene Field Day, the sweet pink Resene Valentine or mellow yellow Resene Moondance.

A word about wallpaper

Wallpaper isn’t as tricky to hang as it used to be, so is an achievable job for an enthusiastic DIYer. Many of today’s unwoven wallpapers are hung using the paste-the-wall method which means literally that – you paste the wall rather than the paper or soaking the paper in water so you’re not having to wrangle soaked drops of paper across the room and up onto the wall.

Today’s modern wallpapers are also much easier to remove when it’s time for a change, unlike older papers which were often tricky to strip off.

You can get plenty of advice on hanging wallpaper from staff at your local Resene ColorShop, where you’ll also find all of the tools for the job.

Project by Annick Larkin. Photography by Bryce Carleton. July 2022