How to Choose a Printed Wallpaper for a More Contemporary Space

How to Choose a Printed Wallpaper for a More Contemporary Space

Wallpaper is often billed as one of the more traditional interior design choices. While it has come a very long way – and taken on a lot more inspiration – than the ornate, rococo motifs and florals of the 18th century, it still feels like the less obvious choice if what you’re going for is a modern home.

For a while now, modernity and minimalism have gone (more or less) hand in hand – but things can only stay ‘modern’ for so long…

These days, interior designers are favouring new and original ways to integrate the more classical elements into a definitively modern home – including wallpaper. Intricate details can be used very effectively in contemporary design, so you don’t need to resign yourself to blocks of white and neutral tones if you don’t want to.

If you’re wondering whether or not your home can benefit from the introduction of wallpaper, then think about the following pointers.

How committed are you to colour?

Distancing yourself from the very classic ‘tropes’ of interior design doesn’t require a grand departure from beautiful patterns and prints. A seemingly small change from one colour palette to another can be just as effective as many of the more obvious techniques and styles used in modernist décor, while offering you more scope for putting your own personal stamp on it. 

For instance, floral patterned wallpapers are a favourite of many traditional design styles but consider the effect of a floral pattern that features a bolder and less ‘expected’ colour story.

Is a big print a necessity?

A lot of people assume that, if you’re trying to establish a definitively modern theme with wallpaper, the best thing to do is to commit to a big, bold, statement-making print. There’s nothing wrong with this, and it’s clearly an effective choice, but that’s not to say that you should rule-out the polar opposite immediately.

By this, we mean that it’s okay for a wallpaper to blend in a little more with the rest of the contrasting textures and prints of a room. It won’t lose efficacy just because it’s subtler or making a quieter statement.

Take a look at this Tulkan Soft Green Wallpaper. The pattern is small and more understated than a lot of other wallpaper prints, and that makes it ideal for creating a sense of texture and depth without jarring or competing with other features in the room.

The statement it makes may not be the same as a grand, sweeping print, but it’s no less powerful.

Are you willing to break convention with placement, rather than print?

It’s understandable why the first thing that comes into any of our minds when we think of ‘modern’ and ‘wallpaper’ in the same sentence is choosing a print that poses no risk of turning the living room into an ode to ‘the classics’. But modernist interior design is all about breaking new ground, and there is plenty of ground to be broken besides the obvious.

Certain modernist trends – like stark minimalism – come and go but, in our experience, one of the most enduring is the trend of blending the modern with the traditional. This could be subverting colour expectations, or it could be using shape and placement to your advantage.

For this, choosing any wallpaper pattern you feel yourself leaning towards – no matter how reflective of more traditional styles it is – is key. The modern aspect stems from finding new and unique ways to actually use that wallpaper.

These days, people are expanding beyond the whole wall/feature wall choice. Using wallpaper to create arches, to zone a space within a larger space, and to add extra details into seemingly inconspicuous spaces like doorways all offer alternative ways to incorporate new prints into a space taking the very ‘traditional’ routes.

Unless your approach to ‘contemporary’ is characterised by a spartan approach to colour, furniture, décor and lighting, there’s a very strong chance that your home won’t be dragged back into a previous decade by the introduction of wallpaper. In fact, even the more traditional prints can be used in a way that screams ‘modernity’, provided you exercise your own creative freedom over the project.

In essence, don’t turn your back on every wallpaper your fall for ‘just because’. Loosen the reins, and trust that the end result will be worth it.