Grasscloth Wallpaper

Grasscloth wallpaper: a woven wall that shifts with the light

Grasscloth wallpaper behaves differently at eight in the morning than at eight at night. Early light rakes across the weave, picking out every slub and knot; by evening the wall settles into a soft, matte field of color. Flat paint cannot do that, which is why an entryway in woven fiber reads as finished the day it goes up.

Rooms where a grasscloth weave works well

Grasscloth in the entryway, dining room and den

Hallways are seen in passing, at an angle, which is how a woven wall shows its best side: a warm sisal reads almost like hand-troweled plaster from across the room and gives up its texture only up close. In a dining room the fiber takes the edge off hard surfaces. In a den or primary bedroom, a muted weave in oatmeal, taupe or deep olive gives the walls weight without asking for attention, especially with trim painted close to the paper's tone.

Powder room and mudroom: where woven fiber stops working

Natural fiber and steam are poor company. A powder room with good ventilation is usually fine, a full bath is not. For the woven look somewhere damp, or where small hands reach the wall, our printed woven-look wallpaper gives you the grain without the natural fiber.

Which grasscloth weave to choose: sisal, abaca, jute, raffia or paper

Start with the fiber. Sisal has a full, springy grain that stands up to a busy hallway. Abaca is spun finer, so the surface stays quiet even in dark colors. Jute is the coarse one, warm and a little rustic next to oak and linen. Raffia lies flatter, in wide strips you read from across the room, and paperweave draws the most graphic line of the group.

Seams, dye lots and hanging grasscloth on drywall

Two things trip people up. The seams stay visible: strips are butt-joined, and the join belongs to the material rather than to poor workmanship. Color runs from roll to roll too, since the grasses are dyed in batches: order the whole room at once and hang the rolls in sequence. New drywall wants a coat of primer first. Paste goes on the wall, never on the face, and anything reaching the front is wiped off right away, because it dries as a pale stain.

Ordering grasscloth wallpaper across the Atlantic

Duties and taxes are included in the price shown and every roll ships from the Netherlands, so no second bill turns up at the door. Two questions are worth settling before you order. The weave: houses such as Élitis and Pierre Frey push the fiber into expressive finishes, while the quieter neutrals do their work almost silently, and a sample taped to your own wall settles that faster than any screen. Then the math: our wallpaper calculator switches to feet and inches, so you can order in the units you measure in.