Print Rooms revisited

 I taught a class on Print Rooms for the 21st Century recently.

 

It was during the Decorative Artisans convention in Memphis TN.  Next year it's in Portland OR.

What the heck are print rooms??  Well. they are an early and rather grand 'form of scrap booking' where well to do home owners would paste prints of their travels over walls and screens to amuse, entertain (and brag a little) about their travels. This is an example.

and so is this.

We are talking about travel years 1750 to 1820 well before budget airlines.  I was thrilled to find a teacher and practitioner of the old style print rooms in America.  She is Cynthia Bogart of printrooms.com  Rhode Island.   I am not in America but many of my artistic friends are and I think print rooms whether the traditional kind or my version are a good weapon in the arsenal of a decorative artist and she travels to teach classes.  Cynthia worked with Nicola Wingate Saul the doyenne of the print room revival in Britain.  A few original examples exist in England and Ireland but none survived in America. One of my treasured books featuring Print rooms ancient and fairly modern....(not modern enough to feature Stencil Library print rooms though) is Paper Magic by Jane Gordon Clark.

These images of Print Rooms are from her book.

 

Here is one of her modern versions

and here are some of The Stencil Library's.

and here is another, an old style with a new technique.

All our frames are stencilled onto the wall (screen, floor, ceiling, whatever). The entire collection of Print Room stencils can be viewed here and you can see more pictures if you click on 'Print Room Gallery' on the side bar of this blog. I am teaching the Print Room class at my studio in Stocksfield, Northumberland on the afternoon of Sunday 27th September.  During the class we will learn decoupage skills

and stencil with plaster,

transfer leaf and paint.

The aim is to generally have a nice time whilst learning new skills. It is suitable for beginners as well as experienced stencillers. Want to join us? Contact me for more details.

Helen

Comments

[Theresa]

Such a wonderful post! The print rooms are works of art in themselves...you have me thinking.....

[Catherine]

OK, that does it, I must do a print room stencil. I LOVE them but had no place to put them but now I have thought of a spot, maybe two? Now I have to decide WHICH one to get AND I bought the book used from amazon. AND she has another one on wallpaper I bought used also. So thanks so much for Forcing me (hahaha) to spend money today! Cat
Catherine

[stencil helen]

Hi Theresa, I agree print rooms are fabulous. I bought quite few paper swags from the national trust collection some years back with the idea of print rooming my shower room.
I have written a blog post about you and your wonderful artistry, it should appear in the next couple of weeks, it;s some more of your wonderful Chinoiser work.

[Lynne Rutter]

lovely images! this is such a great decor idea for a small space- you want to get up close to see all the little gems!