
Chinese wallpaper collections
Visit the National Trust Collections website to discover more Chinese wallpapers in our care.
As trade between Europe and Asia grew in the 17th and 18th centuries, Europeans developed a taste for Chinese art and design, and from the mid-18th century Chinese wallpaper became a staple ingredient of the British country house. Discover some of the examples of this cosmopolitan taste in the care of the National Trust, selected by Emile de Bruijn, Assistant National Curator Decorative Arts.
In the early 18th century, Europeans increasingly used Chinese prints and paintings as wall decoration. In response, Chinese artisans began to supply pictorial wallpapers to Europe, probably from the 1740s.
The National Trust looks after the largest collection of historic Chinese wallpapers on permanent public display in the world. Discover some of the most notable examples here.
Saltram is home to rare early schemes of Chinese ‘wallpaper’ consisting of collages of paintings and prints, probably created in the 1740s or 1750s.
The pictures used in the Study, originally a private sitting room, show landscapes, cityscapes, human figures and deities. They appear to have been made for the Chinese market and may have been brought from Guangzhou (Canton) to Europe by an enterprising ship commander or merchant.
Until recently, it was assumed that Chinese wallpapers were always entirely painted by hand. In fact, the early examples made around 1750, like the paper at Ightham Mote, were partly woodblock printed. The Ightham paper also shows how Chinese wallpapers had to be extensively cut and rearranged to make them fit onto the walls of European mansions.
Visit the National Trust Collections website to discover more Chinese wallpapers in our care.
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