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sites/wallcovering.json
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{
"slug": "wallcovering",
"domain": "wallcovering.net",
"siteName": "Wallcovering",
"port": 11136,
"siteEmail": "info@wallcovering.net",
"tagline": "Wallcovering — the catalog.",
"heroHeadline": "Wallcovering",
"heroSub": "Explore the collection",
"metaDesc": "Wallcovering — Wallcovering — the catalog. Free memo samples, expert trade service, and hand-holding on every order from Designer Wallcoverings.",
"nicheLabel": "designer wallcoverings",
"aboutCopy": "Wallcovering curates designer wallcoverings for designers, architects, and discerning homeowners. Wallcovering — the catalog. Every selection is backed by Designer Wallcoverings' decades of trade experience.",
"niche": {
"pos": [],
"neg": [],
"types": [
"Wallcovering"
]
},
"theme": {
"accent": "#7d3c00",
"bg": "#14110d",
"bgLight": "#faf7f2",
"ink": "#f3efe8",
"inkLight": "#1a1714",
"rule": "#d8cec0",
"serif": "'Cormorant Garamond','Playfair Display',Georgia,serif",
"sans": "-apple-system,'Inter',system-ui,sans-serif",
"palette": "ivory",
"font": "cormorant"
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"monetize": true,
"heroImage": "https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0015/4117/7456/files/morris-acorn-morris-and-co-ochre-fabric-236827-image01.jpg?v=1788956952",
"content": {
"lede": "Wallcovering is the broadest word in the room. It holds everything from a humble printed paper to a hand-painted silk, from a contract vinyl that shrugs off a hospital corridor to a grasscloth woven from real reeds. Knowing the categories is how you stop guessing and start choosing.",
"sections": [
{
"h": "The major material families",
"body": "Most wallcoverings fall into a handful of families, and the family decides more than the pattern does. Printed papers are the oldest and most affordable, lovely and matte but delicate around moisture and scuffs. Vinyls, whether solid-sheet or vinyl-coated, trade some of that softness for washability and durability, which is why they dominate kitchens, baths, and every commercial corridor. Non-woven papers, a modern blend of natural and synthetic fibers, install paste-the-wall and strip off cleanly, making them the most forgiving option for a DIY hang.\n\nThen there are the natural and specialty materials that read as luxury: grasscloth and other woven naturals, real silk, cork, mica, and metallic leaf. These bring texture and depth no print can fake, but they demand more of the wall and the installer, and most cannot be scrubbed. Choosing a family honestly against the room's real conditions is the single most important decision, because a beautiful material in the wrong room fails no matter how good the pattern is."
},
{
"h": "Measuring, matching, and ordering",
"body": "Ordering wallcovering is where good intentions go wrong. Wallpaper is sold by the roll but priced and used by the way it repeats, so you cannot simply divide wall area by roll coverage. Every patterned paper has a repeat, and where the design must match across seams — a straight match lines up level, a drop match steps down — you lose material to alignment. The bigger the repeat, the more waste, and a large-repeat scenic can eat a surprising amount of extra roll.\n\nThe defenses are simple. Measure the wall area carefully, find the pattern repeat, and add a waste allowance that grows with the repeat size, then order enough at once to guarantee a single dye lot. Color varies subtly between production runs, so a mid-project reorder can arrive visibly off, and matching attic stock is worth keeping for future repairs. When in doubt, order a full extra roll; it is far cheaper than discovering you are short one strip on the last wall."
},
{
"h": "Installation and living with it",
"body": "A wallcovering is only as good as the wall under it. Surface prep — filling, sanding, and priming with the right primer for the product — is the unglamorous work that determines whether the finished wall looks crisp or telegraphs every flaw and bubble. Different materials want different adhesives and different handling: delicate naturals stain if paste touches the face, while non-wovens tolerate a paste-the-wall method that keeps the paper dry and stable.\n\nOnce it is up, matching maintenance to the material keeps it looking right. A washable vinyl takes a damp cloth and mild cleaner; a grasscloth or silk wants gentle dusting and no water. Knowing the product's cleanability before you hang it in a high-touch spot saves a lot of regret, and keeping a note of the exact product and dye lot makes the eventual repair or refresh straightforward instead of a detective job."
}
],
"guideTitle": "Quick checklist before you order",
"guide": [
{
"k": "Match material to room",
"v": "Washable vinyl for wet and high-touch spaces; naturals and silk for calm, dry rooms."
},
{
"k": "Find the repeat",
"v": "Note the pattern repeat and add waste allowance that grows with a larger repeat."
},
{
"k": "One dye lot",
"v": "Order all you need at once so color matches; keep attic stock for repairs."
},
{
"k": "Prep the wall",
"v": "Fill, sand, and prime with the correct primer — the finish is only as good as the prep."
},
{
"k": "Know the cleaning",
"v": "Confirm scrubbability before hanging; naturals dust only, vinyls take a damp cloth."
}
],
"faqTitle": "Frequently asked",
"faq": [
{
"q": "What is the difference between wallpaper and wallcovering?",
"a": "Wallcovering is the umbrella term for any wall material, including vinyls, grasscloth, and specialty finishes; wallpaper usually means the printed-paper subset of that category."
},
{
"q": "How many rolls of wallpaper do I need?",
"a": "Measure the wall area, then add a waste allowance based on the pattern repeat rather than dividing area by roll coverage — larger repeats waste more, so round up and buy one dye lot."
},
{
"q": "Which wallcovering is best for a bathroom?",
"a": "A washable vinyl or vinyl-coated product handles moisture and cleaning best; delicate papers, grasscloth, and silk are poor choices for a humid, splash-prone room."
}
],
"about": "This is an independent, general guide to wallcoverings — the materials, the ordering math, and the installation basics — for anyone trying to choose and buy with confidence. We are vendor-neutral and take no advertising from the products we describe.",
"guidePage": {
"lede": "Beyond the basics, a few decisions separate a wall that lasts from one you redo. Sheen, scale, and the room's real light are where confident choices are made.",
"sections": [
{
"h": "Sheen, texture, and how a wall reads",
"body": "The finish of a wallcovering changes a room as much as its color. A matte, chalky surface absorbs light and reads as soft and quiet, forgiving of imperfect walls but easily marked. A satin or lacquered finish reflects light, adds drama and depth, and cleans well, but it shows every lump beneath it, so it demands near-perfect prep. Textured naturals like grasscloth and cork sit between the two, scattering light into a living surface that never looks flat.\n\nMatch the sheen to the job. A high-sheen paper energizes a small windowless powder room by bouncing light around it, while the same finish in a large sunlit room can glare. A textured natural warms up a hard modern space and softens sound. Deciding what you want the wall to do to the light is a better starting point than deciding what color it should be."
},
{
"h": "Scale, pattern, and the size of the room",
"body": "Pattern scale is where rooms most often go wrong. A small print can make a large wall feel busy and restless, while a large-scale motif in a tiny room can feel confident and jewel-like rather than crowded — the opposite of the cautious instinct most people have. What matters is the relationship between the repeat and the wall, and the distance from which the pattern is usually seen.\n\nA reliable approach is to look at a large sample on the actual wall, from where you normally stand, before deciding. Vertical patterns lift a low ceiling, horizontal ones widen a narrow room, and a busy all-over print hides bumps and doors that a large open pattern would expose. Reading the room's proportions first, then choosing the scale to correct or celebrate them, turns pattern from a gamble into a tool."
},
{
"h": "Working with an installer",
"body": "For anything beyond a forgiving non-woven in a simple room, a skilled installer earns their fee many times over. Naturals, silks, murals, and large-repeat patterns punish inexperience: seams that should vanish become visible, panels go up out of sequence, and expensive material is wasted on mistakes that cannot be undone. A good hanger also reads the wall, flags moisture or prep problems before they ruin the job, and plans the seam layout so the pattern falls where it should.\n\nBrief the installer like a partner. Share the pattern repeat, the match type, the sequence for a scenic or mural, and any tricky corners or fixtures, and confirm the adhesive and primer suit the product. The best result comes from the material, the wall, and the person hanging it all agreeing with each other, and that agreement starts with a clear conversation before the first drop goes up."
}
]
},
"articles": [
{
"title": "The material families of wallcovering, and how the trade classifies them",
"dek": "Wallcovering is an umbrella term, not a single product. A reference to the major material families and the durability classes and commercial types used to grade them.",
"body": "'Wallcovering' is a trade umbrella that covers everything from a printed paper to a woven reed to a sheet of solid vinyl. The word became standard in the mid-twentieth century precisely because 'wallpaper' no longer described a category that had grown to include materials made of no paper at all. Understanding the families is the difference between guessing and specifying.\n\nPrinted paper is the oldest family and the widest in pattern. It is inexpensive, matte, and pleasant in person, but it scuffs, does not tolerate moisture well, and is the least durable of the common types. Non-woven paper is its modern relative — a blend of natural and synthetic fibers engineered to be dimensionally stable, to hang by the paste-the-wall method, and to strip off cleanly in whole sheets, which makes it the most forgiving option for both installer and future occupant.\n\nVinyl is the workhorse family and comes in gradations. Vinyl-coated paper adds a thin protective film to a paper base for light washability; paper-backed and fabric-backed solid vinyls are progressively heavier and tougher, and fabric-backed vinyl is the standard commercial wall material because it survives scrubbing, abrasion, and daily traffic. The trade sorts these commercial vinyls under CFFA-W-101 by finished weight: Type I runs roughly 7 to 13 ounces per linear yard, Type II about 13 to 22 ounces, and Type III above 22 ounces, with Type II serving as the general-purpose commercial grade for corridors and public rooms.\n\nThe natural and specialty families trade durability for texture and depth. Grasscloth, sisal, and other woven naturals; real silk; cork; mica; and metallic leaf read as rich because they are, but most cannot be scrubbed and show seams as a feature rather than a flaw. Specialty finishes — flocks that imitate cut velvet, foils, embossed papers, and printed murals — round out the category, each solving for a particular look rather than a particular stress.\n\nCutting across the families is a durability language worth knowing. ASTM F793 classifies wallcoverings into six categories, from Category I (decorative only) through Category III (decorative with high serviceability) and on to Categories IV, V, and VI, which map to the Type I, Type II, and Type III commercial grades and are scored on washability, scrubbability, abrasion, and stain resistance. A category number describes what a product can take regardless of what it is made of. Read the family for the look and feel, and read the classification for whether it belongs in the room you have in mind.",
"slug": "material-families-of-wallcovering-classified"
},
{
"title": "A short history of the decorated wall, from hand-painted papers to vinyl",
"dek": "Wallcovering has a five-century lineage — imported Chinese papers, the panoramic scenics of Zuber, the Arts and Crafts revival, and the machine age that made pattern ordinary.",
"body": "Decorated walls long predate paper: painted plaster, woven hangings, and tooled leather all covered walls for those who could afford them. Paper entered as the affordable imitation of those luxuries, and the whole modern industry grew out of that substitution.\n\nHand-painted papers imported from China through the East India trading companies in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries set the aspiration — non-repeating scenes of birds and blossoming trees, painted panel by panel. European makers answered first with 'domino' papers, small printed sheets, and then with real ambition. In Paris, Jean-Baptiste Réveillon built a celebrated wallpaper manufactory in the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, whose destruction in the Réveillon riot of April 1789 became one of the sparks of that revolutionary spring.\n\nThe panoramic scenic was the high-water mark of the block-printed era. Zuber et Cie, founded in 1797 in Rixheim, Alsace, printed room-wrapping landscapes from hundreds of hand-carved woodblocks, and the firm still prints from those original blocks today — a set now protected as French historic heritage. Alongside the scenics came embossed durability: Frederick Walton, who had invented linoleum, patented Lincrusta in 1877, and the lighter Anaglypta followed around 1887, both giving walls a washable, low-relief surface that could be painted.\n\nThe nineteenth century then split into two directions at once. Machine printing arrived around 1840 with surface-printing presses that made patterned paper cheap enough for ordinary households, while a reaction against that industrial sameness produced the Arts and Crafts revival. From the 1860s William Morris designed block-printed papers — 'Trellis,' 'Daisy,' 'Pomegranate' — that insisted on the hand and the honest motif against the machine's flood of imitation.\n\nThe twentieth century brought the material that renamed the whole field. Washable, durable vinyls spread through commercial and then residential interiors from mid-century, and because the category now held products with no paper in them, the trade adopted 'wallcovering' as the honest umbrella term. The lineage runs unbroken from a hand-painted Chinese panel to a fabric-backed contract vinyl: the same instinct to make a wall mean something, answered by five centuries of changing craft.",
"slug": "short-history-of-the-decorated-wall"
},
{
"title": "Wallcovering versus paint: what actually differs between the two",
"dek": "Looks are only part of it. A neutral comparison of how wallcovering and paint differ on flaws, texture, repair, removal, durability, and true installed cost.",
"body": "Wallcovering and paint are the two default ways to finish a wall, and they behave differently enough that the right answer depends on the wall and the room, not on taste alone. A neutral look at where they actually diverge makes the decision clearer than any style argument.\n\nThe first difference is how each treats an imperfect wall. Paint is thin and honest: it reveals every ridge, patch, and roller mark unless the surface is skimmed smooth, and a high sheen makes flaws worse. A textured or all-over-patterned wallcovering does the opposite, hiding minor unevenness under its own surface, while a high-gloss or large-open-pattern covering can telegraph flaws as readily as paint. Texture and dimension are things a covering can add and paint cannot.\n\nRepair and change cut the other way. A painted wall is trivially touched up and repainted, and a color change is a weekend. A damaged wallcovering usually means replacing a full strip and matching a dye lot that may no longer exist, which is why keeping attic stock matters, and a full change means stripping and re-prepping the wall. Paint wins on flexibility; wallcovering wins on staying put.\n\nDurability and moisture depend on the product, and here the specifications diverge. A fabric-backed commercial vinyl rated Category V or VI under ASTM F793 is engineered for scrubbing and abrasion in public traffic, a level of serviceability no wall paint claims, while a delicate paper or natural is far more fragile than paint. Paint offers washable and scrubbable grades of its own but adds no texture, and the moisture question turns entirely on choosing a washable covering for a wet room rather than a paper that will not survive it. On emissions, both sides now compete: low-VOC and zero-VOC paints are common, and many wallcoverings carry low-emitting indoor-air certifications for the same green-building specifications.\n\nCost structure is the difference people underestimate. Paint is cheap in material and moderate in labor, and a competent homeowner can do it. Wallcovering ranges from paper under a dollar a square foot to hand-screened and natural goods at five to fifteen dollars or more, and skilled installation frequently equals the material cost, so the honest comparison is installed cost over the years the finish will last, not the price of a can against the price of a roll.\n\nThe choice comes down to the wall and the plan for it. Paint suits surfaces you expect to change, budgets that are tight, and walls already smooth. Wallcovering suits walls that need their flaws hidden, rooms that want texture or a specific pattern, and finishes meant to last, provided the material is matched honestly to the room's traffic and moisture.",
"slug": "wallcovering-versus-paint-what-differs"
},
{
"title": "How wallcovering is made: from a designer's repeat to a printed roll",
"dek": "Surface, gravure, screen, and digital printing each leave a different fingerprint on a roll. A reference to the substrates, inks, and methods behind the finished material.",
"body": "A finished roll hides several distinct steps, and the method used at each one explains a great deal about how the product looks, what it costs, and how it will wear. Following a design from artwork to roll is the clearest way to understand the differences a spec sheet only hints at.\n\nIt begins with the repeat. A designer resolves artwork into a tile that meets itself cleanly on all sides at a set vertical and horizontal repeat, and chooses a match type — straight, drop, or random — that the tile can hold across a seam. Everything downstream, including how much material an installation wastes, is fixed at this stage.\n\nThe substrate and its ground come next. A base of paper, non-woven fiber, or a fabric scrim is coated with a ground color that becomes the field the pattern prints onto, and on vinyl goods a plastic layer is applied to the backing to give the finished washability and weight. The substrate is chosen for how the covering will hang and strip as much as for how it will print.\n\nThen the pattern is printed, and the method is the product's fingerprint. Surface and rotary printing press ink from raised rollers at high speed and low cost, giving the flat, graphic look of mass-market goods. Gravure prints from a cylinder engraved with tiny recessed cells that hold ink, which is why it renders fine tonal gradation a raised roller cannot. Hand screen printing pushes ink through a separate screen for each color, so a ten-color design needs ten screens and ten passes, laying down the thick, saturated, slightly raised color of high-end goods one hue at a time — slow, costly, and unmistakable up close.\n\nDigital printing changed what the last step can do. Latex and UV-cured large-format printers image directly from a file, which makes short runs, custom colorways, photographic imagery, and non-repeating murals economical in a way the older methods never allowed. The trade-off is a different surface and durability profile, so digital goods are specified on their own merits rather than as a substitute for a screen print.\n\nFinishing sets the final character. Embossing rolls texture into the surface, coatings add scrubbability or a matte or satin sheen, and the goods are trimmed, matched, inspected, and rolled to length with a run number that ties every roll in a batch to one dye lot. Read backward from the roll, the surface tells you the method, and the method tells you the price and the wear — which is why knowing how it was made is a practical skill, not trivia.",
"slug": "how-wallcovering-is-made"
}
],
"articlesLede": "In-depth guides and practical articles on designer wallcoverings."
},
"ga4": "G-8PPC85GLW4"
}