St James's
1881 · Block-printed wallpaper on paper · Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum
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About this work
- Artist
- William Morris (1834–1896)
- Year
- 1881
- Medium
- Block-printed wallpaper on paper
- Original size
- 52.5 × 57 cm
- Collection
- Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum
- Movement
- Arts and Crafts
A close view of a very large design: a huge grey-blue acanthus leaf curls across a turquoise ground beside an apricot, fruit-like flower and a peach bloom, with small leaves and twisting stems behind. William Morris designed St James's in 1881 for the Grand Staircase of St James's Palace in London, part of a royal scheme his firm had worked on since 1866. According to the V&A, two widths of paper are needed to complete the pattern across, the vertical repeat is 119.4 cm, and sixty-eight blocks were cut to print it; the blocks burned in a fire at Jeffrey & Co. on 22 November 1881 and were later recut. The palace paper was printed on red; this blue-ground sheet, with touches of gold and silver, shows a vertical fold line. It is in the Cooper Hewitt.
This print fills the sheet edge to edge with the pattern, cropped from a high-resolution museum scan of the original, so it reads like a panel of the wallpaper or fabric. The exhibition poster shows the whole sample. The design is in the public domain.
Where it works
Oversized acanthus and apricot blooms on turquoise give a bold, architectural scale for a living room, stair wall or entrance hall. Pair it with Golden Lily at 16×24 in natural wood.
Style, size & framing detail
- Style
- Arts and Crafts pattern
- Era
- 19th century (1881)
- Orientation
- Portrait
- Mood
- decorative, classic
- Rooms
- living room
Size. We'd hang this one at 16×24. Prints at 12×18, 16×24 in — 12×18 for a shelf, desk or a gallery-wall grid; 16×24 above a desk, console or in a hallway.
Framing. Printed edge to edge: a slim black or natural wood frame right to the pattern, or let the canvas wrap do the framing. Also available gallery-wrapped on canvas, ready to hang with no frame.
Pairing. Hangs alone or as a matched pair; three or more prints are 10% off.
