Textile Hangings on the Wall

The Power of Wallhangings has been a bit obsolet lately - but it is an instrument for decoration in a house which should not be underestimated. There are several possibilities of displaying lovely textures and fabrics on your walls. Here I will not speak about tapestries, as very few of us have the possibilities to hang those, nor the means to aquire them. I will talk of those easy and affordable examples, which need only a little bit of an eye and imagination.

I grew up with fabric next to my bed - my mother used to hang simple curtains next to our beds on the wall and I have ever since done the same - it gives a room right away another feeling of cosiness.

Our guestroom in Brussels

 In all my humble abodes I have always used this simple trick for my children in their rooms - they felt cosy and I think it is lovely for them to fall asleep next to a beautiful textured or designed cosy material, and not to a blank wall.

I also remember in the 1980ies being in England, to visit an old polish aunt - they lived in a smallish house somewhere in the outskirts of London. The room, where I was to sleep, belonged to an uncle, who at the time was not present and I had a room for myself: it was a small darkish room, full of books, and the old Bateaubed had at the wall a kelim and a ceiling hanging in some fabric, which must have been some cashmere paisleyshawl - it was wonderful, with an exotic, oriental and very masculine feeling. Restricted, not luxurious, but full of personality.

At home I found an old kelim, which somehow was waiting for me in the attic and got it in my treasurebox - and when I moved on to university, and had my first room rented, I hang it next to my simple mattress-cum-feet which also doubled as a sofa - a bed-sitting-cum-study. I felt at home and chez moi.

I have used that Kelim ever since as a bedhanging, in all possible places where I lived, be it in Portugal, in Turkey or in Belgium. Recently I had it taken down and actually I miss it. Textiles hanging at the wall make a room lived in and give it a certain atmosphere.

Biedermeier Trunk and turkish woolhanging

In Turkey I bought, out of utter joy, a wollen wallhanging in vivid green, which I had thrown over a Paravent, standing behind my writing desk in the salon - it was an eyecatcher and made the salon a little bit less formal, gave it a quirk, which I always consider as essential in interior decoration. Nowadays it hangs in the hall in our first floor, over an old trunk I brought with me from Bavaria - it is filled with fabrics of all sorts, and also, if I remember well, my weddingdress.

Also I remember vividly a beautiful embroidery an american friend had ( and hopefully still has!) hanging over a gustavian commode in her flat then in Ankara - every time I was at her place, I admired it and wished to possess one myself.

In Portugal is a very old habit of hanging a huge piece of embroidered or quilted of fabric in front of the doors or over a sofa on the sitting room. Normally those hangings display the armories of the family, to which the rooms belong, and it gives some grandeur and feeling of selfconscioussness to the room. Not to impress, but to convey a feeling to be "at home", in my view.

The most talented of hangers though is my brother in Regensburg. He and my sister in law inhabit one of the most original houses I know - a medieval townhouse, with a smallish and reclused garden in the back. The rooms are small and low, but give you immediatly the impression of coming home - not at least also in their way, how they display kelims and oriental and even african fabrics in the rooms. One of the bedrooms has a bed, which is almost an alcove - I have never slept better than there and the whole idea, coming from the middle ages, to make a room less cold and protect you from a draught has come here to a new meaning: like a smallish place only for yourself, not bare given over to winds and looks from outside.
It must be a very old heritage, this feeling of being safe and secure.

PS: My brother is taking a whole new approach to hanging fabric on a wall - he recently made a series of drawings, gardenscenes and also architecture which after were printed on a longish piece of fabric, which can be hung alone or in a series on the wall - thus providing a sort of background, which gives interest to an otherwise bare room. In the end, it is following in the tradition of the great landscape-wallpapers, which were all the furor in the late 18th century in France and England: just think of the beautiful wallpapers by Zuber in Switzerland, with landscapes in a great scale or chinoiseries. The Regensburg hangings are meant for the small appartment, with little space and a need for having something of interest hanging behind your chair. And so a room is furnished, with more or less nothing...