Wallpaper sample 50 cm.

Wallpaper sample 50 cm.

The Lars-Daniels farm in Järvsö, is a typical Hälsingland farm from the first half of the 19th century; two-storey, timber, red colored, many windows with green hand-blown glass panes, decorated bridge sprig … The main building has remained largely untouched since it was built. Since it was mostly used as a mobilization camp for the military during the 20th century, there has been no reason to renovate it. The “Great Chamber” is one of the most well-preserved rooms in the house and this stenciled wallpaper comes from there. The date is around 1840. The wallpaper is a mixture of styles; First, one of the 18th century’s favorite patterns – sparsely scattered floral bouquets against a plain background, but here combined with a delicate, lace-like medallion pattern of the type that came with the neo-rococo only a hundred years later. This is what is so interesting about the interior design of the common people, often unconventional style combinations, often “extra everything” but as a final product still neither vulgar nor tasteless. The commoners were masters of this balancing act. Another safe stylistic move is that the stenciled wallpaper is often combined with a calm, single-colored breast panel up to window height, so that the room, despite the large-patterned wallpaper, still became calm and well-proportioned.The original wallpaper is painted with glue paint on rag paper and has been over-papered several times, which is why many of the finest details in the lace pattern have been lost over time. When reprinting the wallpaper, we have been careful to preserve this patina and have chosen not to reconstruct the pattern to perfection. The soul of Gysinge’s wallpapers is generally that they are not so perfect.

When, in connection with the restoration of one of the attics at Wirums Säteri in Småland, we found the first flake of the wallpaper “Förmaket”, we thought we had found a real 18th century wallpaper. The diagonal checkered pattern with a small flower sprig in each square breathes very typical rococo. The flaming gray glue paint base also gives an unmistakable feeling of hand printing. Everything in our 18th century theory was right – until we found flag number two and saw that the pattern was printed on cellulose paper and not on paper made of cloth rag, as it should have been if it was genuine 18th century. The wallpaper also turned out to be made on a roll, not on glued sheets of paper, as in the 18th century. Today we know better. “Förmaket” is a wallpaper from around 1860, but of a low-key, elegant diagonal-patterned type that became popular already 100 years earlier – and is still one of the wallpaper printers’ favorite patterns. What distinguishes Gysinge’s wallpaper from other reprints is the uneven, handmade impression and the shifting ground color. Early machine printing art, one could define the wallpaper as.