Cole & Son | Versailles Grand (2 roll set)

Versailles Grand is the larger-scale version of the Versailles toile, and it is issued as a two-roll set, an A roll and a B roll, which is what allows the design to repeat across the full width of a wall rather than within a single drop. Hung in the correct order, the two rolls complete a scene no single-roll paper could carry.

The reference is to the glorious French scenic wallpapers of the eighteenth century, and the scale is the reason it works. Enlarged, the finely engraved motifs of the original toile become drawing rather than texture: the trees, follies and animals are read individually, and the wall behaves like a painted landscape rather than a repeating print.

A set of this kind wants planning before anything is cut. The full-width repeat means the drops should be set out from the most important wall in the room, the chimney breast or the wall seen from the door, rather than started in a corner and worked round. Given that, it is one of the most rewarding things Cole & Son make. A dining room, a hall or a stairwell papered in it acquires a subject, and needs almost nothing else beyond good lighting, a plain floor and furniture low enough to keep out of the way.