Little Greene Introduces ‘Storybook Papers,’ Their 5th Wallpaper Collection with the National Trust

On Monday, January 20, the independent luxury wallpaper and paint retailer Little Greene will launch "Storybook Papers," their fifth historic wallpaper collection done in collaboration with the National Trust for England, Wales, and Northern Ireland. A light-hearted adventure into childhood’s past, the eight whimsical wallpaper designs in this collection have been inspired by archive material.

These include historic artifacts, early and mid-twentieth century toys, decorative fabrics, and original artworks, including several by the beloved children’s author (and one of the National Trust’s principal benefactors), Beatrix Potter. Objects such as tin cars and wooden games have been painstakingly drawn by the Little Greene Design Studio, transforming these enchanting, whimsical artifacts into wallpaper designs that capture the charm and character of the originals. 

The collection comprises a range of charming designs, including the quirky surface-printed ‘Animal Kingdom’ featuring colorful elephants, ostriches and penguins; playful illustrations of chicks and ducks in ‘Riverside Capers’ and ‘Rodney Street,’ which depicts a pair of brightly colored vintage, mechanical apple-picking toys. Joining these pictorial and scenic designs are new colorways of Little Greene’s much-loved, generously proportioned ‘Broad Stripe’ wallpaper which has been recolored in a range of joyful combinations. 

Employing a spectrum of printing methods, from traditional surface printing to cutting-edge digital machines, the collection also includes a flocked design, bringing a delightful textural element to Beatrix Potter’s beloved flock of Herdwick sheep in the
‘Nip & Lassie’ wallpaper. 

"It’s always such an honor to have access to the incredible National Trust properties, uncovering and reviving captivating historic designs, reinterpreting them and extending their history in new colorways and formats," said Ruth Mottershead, Little Greene's creative director, in a statement. "It’s wonderful to think that these beautiful pieces of history, including toys, children’s illustrations, and fabrics have now been transformed by the design team into wallpapers that will find their way into contemporary homes, bringing joy for years to come."

The Storybook Papers collection features eight designs, all of which are printed on an easy to apply non-woven substrate. A contribution from the sale of every roll of Little Greene wallpaper will be made in support of the National Trust’s conservation work, to ensure the nation’s historic houses, gardens and open spaces can be enjoyed for generations to come. In addition, Little Greene will continue to support the National Trust’s important conservation and restoration program by donating paints and papers to bring color and life back to some of the UK’s most loved properties. 

Little Greene paints and wallpapers are available nationally and internationally through Little Greene’s network of distributors, as well as via email and online at www.littlegreene.com. Little Greene is an independent, family-run business and the only manufacturer still producing a complete range of traditional and modern decorative paints for all areas of the home alongside a diverse range of wallpapers spanning 200 years of decoration. The pigments used in the paints and to print the wallpapers are completely non-toxic and sourced inside the EU thereby ensuring they have both environmental certification and are free from any chance of being associated with slavery or child labor.

This quirky scene is drawn from a printed 1930s fabric found at Tyntesfield, a secluded manor house in North Somerset, which was a family home as recently as 2001. It was made into slipcovers for furniture in the children’s nursery. Featuring a polar bear and penguins alongside an elephant and an ostrich, the playful design is rich in ‘new world’ imagination and has translated effortlessly into a surface-printed wallpaper pattern in a range of confident colorways. 

The dogs in this design are Beatrix Potter’s doodled portraits of her beloved working collies, Nip and Lassie. The original sketches are tiny but effortlessly translated into a light-hearted wallpaper design, in which the accompanying sheep have been flocked to bring extra surface texture. Beatrix was known for her dedication to farming, and in particular her award-winning stock of Herdwick sheep. The breed is synonymous with her beloved Lake District, some 4000 acres of which was bequeathed by her to the National Trust after her death in 1943. 

The naïve line quality in this design accurately references the pair of vintage, mechanical apple-picking toys that inspired it. They are small pieces amongst a huge collection of mostly twentieth century artifacts now cared for by the National Trust at The Hardman’s House in Rodney Street, Liverpool. An elegant Georgian property, it is authentically preserved in its 1950s state having served as both home and busy photographic studio for the prestigious portrait photographer Edward Chambré Hardman and his business partner and wife, Margaret. 

Four framed motifs make up this design, each one originally the simple subject of a small set of wooden balancing games located at Grey’s Court in Oxfordshire. In the games, a steady hand is required to locate tiny metal ball-bearings in the holes, and although the balls themselves have been omitted from the design, the locations of the holes have been retained in reference to its origin. Another quirk is the rainbow’s inverted color spectrum — it would correctly show the red on the outside and blue on the inside, but is another detail retained in the wallpaper pattern. 

The former servants’ wing at Sudbury Hall in Derbyshire is now home to the National Trust’s ‘Children’s Country House.’ Created with, and for, children of all ages, it is a place where nostalgic childhoods of yesterday are conserved, shared and celebrated. This jolly pattern comprises sketches of a selection of vintage toy cars and trucks, cared for by the Trust, notably at Sudbury but also Nuffield Place, Tyntesfield and Wightwick Manor, amongst others. Aficionados will identify a 1951 Morris Minor, a wooden 1960s Mercedes truck and a glamorous Austin Atlantic from 1956. 

A magical scene which directly references a variety of individual drawings and paintings from the unpublished sketchbooks of Beatrix Potter. Besides her irrepressible appetite for farming the land, Potter was a prolific and accomplished artist, fascinated and inspired by the nature that surrounded her rural home in Ambleside, Cumbria. 

The animals featured in this design were all originally painted by the children’s illustrator Cecil Aldin. A founding member of the London Sketch Club, Aldin was known for his cartoonish animal depictions, and was published alongside literary works by Charles Dickens and Rudyard Kipling, amongst others. A children’s bedroom at Wightwick Manor in the West Midlands features a frieze which includes several of Aldin’s farm animals, including a mother hen with her chicks and a playful line of running ducks. 

Striped fabrics and wallpapers have long been used to bring simple, refined pattern and elegant, effortless color combinations to grand and humble interiors alike. In Georgian and Regency times, this generously proportioned stripe would have been used more frequently in large rooms and amongst bold colors and strong patterns. In contemporary interior design, wide stripes are still used to balance pattern, but have taken on more usability by virtue of the more relaxed, coordinating color palette in which they are now available.