WALLS = function

We could not live without our literal and figurative walls. They are the BIG picture - holding together each room they envelope. They support the structure of the building by linking floor to ceiling. Walls are not only our partition between rooms, they insulate us from the outside world. Where would we be standing without our walls?

Could we ask for anything more from a wall? Well, yes we can. Within each room, the wall serves not only as enclosure, it also links us to other areas. We pierce them to make windows, doors and occasionally fireplaces. These openings facilitate both our passage and inter-connection.

WALLS = art

Onto the walls our design we latch our aesthetics. We layer our objects onto, off or through the wall to add both interest and function to our rooms. These objects include mantles, door and window frames, bookshelves and cabinets for storage space, sconces, mirrors, flat screen TVs, paintings and other objects that we collect and want to showcase for our own pleasure as wells as others.

Bookshelves and cabinets become features resting on or inset to the wall. 

Sir John Soane, an 18-19thC English architect and the son of a bricklayer, worked those walls. His father’s trade and his own calling gave him the gift of being super aware of the wall and it’s function.

Walls can either keep the room alive or send it to its doom

What becomes part of the wall, what goes on the wall or rests against the wall is theater for the room. A good theatrical arrangement moves the eye to want to continue to visit various locations. 

The opening shot is of RUSSELL WRIGHT’s living room. Back in the in the 1950’s he gleefully played with boulders found on his property; placing them on the wall, in the wall, off the wall, pouring them onto the floor and around his fireplace. (MANITOBA - Westchester, NY) 

From ordinary to extraordinary

Do we break all the rules of Elsie de Wolfe when she states:

“The wall is the background of the room, and so must be flat in treatment and reposeful in tone.”

This statement and her opening statement about walls being theater seem at first glance to be a huge contradiction. But perhaps we can have it all. Can’t we balance the restful with the dramatic by featuring objects such as lit rocks and shattered glass recessed into the wall? Can you see one wall in the room with a a hand painted mural or wallpaper, maybe a textural wall hanging, or the placement of objects creates a pattern with books, collectibles, mirror groupings, a set of candelabras or staggered artwork. We seem only to be limited by our imagination (link pat pat pattern).

I gutted an old hamper unit that was partially inset and made an alcove in my bath/shower area to gain space and variety from the mundane of 4 straight walls.

One feature wall can turn an ordinary room into something quite extraordinary.

Here are some extraordinary wall features created by Yabu Pushelberg.

ADORNING THE WALLS/trompe l’oeil

If we place either a wallpaper pattern or a painted scene on a wall, it transports us to another dimension. And if the scene looks and feels so real we can enter into it like Alice in Wonderland, this is trompe l’oeil - trick the eye. By painting the surrounding walls one of the colors from this feature wall, it creates a restful counterbalance.

A great resource for ‘to-die-for’ Arts and Crafts wallpaper that is produced in the United States is trustworth This link will take you to one of their more humorous papers called Alice in Wonderland. 

If you’re looking for something a bit less buzzy and busy please visit our website (Groundplans Wallpaper) to view the wallpapers I’ve produced. These papers are made in the USA. 

The paper on the left is called Bling. Why not add a little bling in your life? Here’s a room setting with the design Birds in Flight.

STENCILING the WALLS

A stenciled wall pattern by one of the contemporaries of William Morris (the founder of the Arts and Crafts Movement in England), a fellow English person, Margaret MacDonald. She is known for her work with her well known architect and furniture maker husband, Charles Rennie Mackintosh. They not only adorned their walls with this stenciled pattern but also went for having a go at the light fixtures as well. 

 FABRIC CUSHIONING THE WALL ADD TEXTURE in a Park Ave lobby/office. Here’s a link to the expertly crafted padded wall of the Jean Paul Gaultier store designed by Philippe Starck (link Jouffre).

Before our modernist period, wall moldings, ceiling moldings and chair rail (link Going Green) were used not just to enhance the wall space but to break up and define an area where a painting hung. These delineations were used as architectural features when ceiling heights were higher than today. 

This sense of elegance changed post WWII with the building of modern apartments; the ceiling height dropped and smaller sized rooms were constructed while buildings became grander. Innovative construction materials helped moved this along (link Building Blocks 2).

Once we could build taller, developers wanted to maximize their investment by packing as many apartments as they could under the same roof. With these proportional changes, moulding and wainscoting ill fit the overall look and budget. 

The sconces are made to look like the original candelabras that would have been lit by flames and hung in those spots to help bring luminosity for navigating the stairs. They also reflect onto the wallpaper to give an increased overall illumination for this main passageway (Link Light).  

Without a painting the focus was on the table so I got started changing all that.

I also wanted to add luminosity and brighten up a blank wall not getting natural sunlight, so I conceived of and executed an unbeknownst to me time consuming gold leaf project. Taking a bunch of old beat up frames that I’d bought from an interior design client/friend at her garage sale for all of $10, I proceeded to get wood cut the size of each frame and gold leafed each of them. Making the project that much more arduous, I first gilded in fake gold leaf but due to its need for an overglaze that didn’t look good, I gilded over them with the real deal - GOLD. 

The mirror is an antique I salvaged from my mother’s beach house. I then placed a chandelier + sconces I’d found at an outdoor market in the south of France and hung my Aunt’s artwork - she had studied with Hans Hoffman in Provincetown - under the chandelier area. Lastly, I brought in 2 pieces of framed art from a 17C Japanese screen that depict the seasons.

hopefully, these additions enhance the space