I wanted to share a recently completed project that had some challenging spaces worth discussing. My clients called me in to work with them on the decorative elements of their full gut renovation of a 100 year old home in Boston.  Old homes always have quirks which makes them both charming and challenging spaces! This home has only one bathroom on the first floor located off the kitchen. This half bath also includes the laundry so it had to be both functional and chic since it is the only available guest bath.

My clients already knew they wanted to use this Les Touches pattern from Brunschwig and Fils for the graphic punch it would offer. So, in addition to wanting the bathroom to be highly functional and beautiful, a challenging pattern was added to the mix. Along with the wallpaper, there was also need for a window treatment for privacy because this is on the first floor and looks out on the back patio. We decided on a 2/3 length cafe curtain on rod and rings to allow some light to come in. We were also doing a matching floor-to-ceiling drapery treatment to cover the laundry side of the space. We considered using a solid fabric, but in the end decided to go “all-in” with Les Touches on the window a drapery wall.

If you look at the closeup above of the fabric and paper, you will see that the pattern includes dark gray and black which gives it depth. We selected Benjamin Moore’s Black Satin for the molding paint as it’s a soft black and not too stark. We also decided to do a black banding around the drapery which allows my clients to pull back the curtains without touching the primary fabric itself. A bathroom and laundry room are working spaces so there is dirt, soap and lint to think about. I selected a black Kravet indoor/outdoor fabric which can be spot cleaned as needed.

Let me tell you, you don’t just slap a pattern like this on the wall – it takes a pro to know where the pattern should fall and how it will “lay” across the entire space. Enter Melanie Harvey who is one of the premier wallpaper installers in Massachusetts. Melanie and I met at the home so she could view the space and estimate the number of rolls required for the job.

There are two main issues to deal with when using a matching wallpaper and fabric. The obvious issue is that you have to match the patterns.   The second issue is that the colors are usually very slightly different. In this case, they are very, very close but can never be exact because they aren’t dyed/printed using the same materials. With a white or very light fabric, the lighting will affect how the color looks. In the case of the cafe curtain, we chose a black out lining so that there was no light bleed from the outside which would have made the fabric look more yellow than white. For the laundry wall drapery there was no issue with light bleed and we decided to leave it unlined to reduce the weight and so it could be pushed as far to the sides as needed.

And so, my drapery workroom waited until the wallpaper was installed before they went in to measure and photograph the pattern placement. The pattern has enough movement in it without adding an off placement. Obviously, since the fabric was slightly gathered, the vertical pattern didn’t match, but the horizontal plain was perfect!

A peak behind the curtain shows that we papered in the laundry alcove as well! There are also cubbies on the window side of the wall for storage. You can see how close everything is!

And finally, the spectacular mirror adds a final moment of literal punctuation to the space. And, notice how perfectly the pattern is centered behind the mirror.

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