A Chinoiserie tradition that became very popular around Europe in the 18th century and particularly in the stately homes of England was Chinese wallpaper. These papers were made in China for the aristocracy and ultra-rich. The fashion emerged because of the interests of yet another royal – George IV, the Prince Regent. These wallpapers were a perfect example of Chinoiserie; because, as wallcoverings, they didn’t exist in China at all, but were created by in China by Chinese artisans entirely for the European market. This episode will visit the magnificent homes where Chinese wallpaper is still lovingly looked after, and profile the British conservators and artists who want to preserve the art form and give it new life.
Category
🛠️
LifestyleTranscript
00:00Tradition, trade, and culture have connected Europe and China for hundreds of years.
00:08In the 18th century, a small number of products escaped from China and lit a touch paper in the
00:13west of excitement. In this special series, we'll uncover the intertwined social and cultural
00:20histories of Europe and China from the ancient Silk Road to the modern era. Art is traveling
00:27as a silent ambassador to spread the word about culture and civilization. It's amazingly
00:33impressive because they were such incredibly talented artists. When you talk about silk,
00:38with a value of three or four garments, you could buy a palace. We'll be seeking out the
00:43European spaces where traces of China lie hidden in plain sight. Wow. This is the Chinese room
00:51and it's definitely one of my favorites within the house.
00:59Welcome to Traces of China.
01:16Temple Newsome House is a 500 year old property in the north of England.
01:21Now treasured as one of the largest publicly owned museums in the country.
01:27It's an amazing household. It has so many accolades, it's hard to choose which one to
01:32talk about. When it was built, it was the largest house in the north of England,
01:37being owned by three different monarchs.
01:45In historic properties like this across Europe, it's believed there could be thousands of rooms
01:50decorated in antique Chinese wallpapers, dating back as far as the 1700s.
01:58Some being preserved in darkness, protected from sunlight and life.
02:05So tell me about the story of this room. What's special about this?
02:09So the Chinese room, or the blue room as it's sometimes referred to, is absolutely astounding.
02:15The wallpaper that we've got up is a choice by one of the characters who lived in the house,
02:21Lady Hertford. And she had a very illicit relationship, or so is told, with the Prince
02:28Regent, who would go on to become George IV. And when he visits in 1806, he actually gifts her
02:33this wallpaper. Gosh, so tell me more about Lady Hertford. So she was quite a character.
02:37Yeah, incredibly strong woman. She was described as one of the most beautiful women in the world
02:42at the period. She would go and visit him, Brighton Pavilion, which is where she fell in
02:47love with the oriental rooms that he had. So this is a portrait of the very famous Lady Hertford.
02:56Wow. You can really tell that she was a real beauty of her day.
03:03When she put it up, she then decided that her taste had changed and what she'd seen and loved
03:09in Brighton Pavilion, she didn't think fit this room. So she got a book that was incredibly
03:14popular at the time called Audubon's Great Birds of America. And she got a pair of scissors and
03:19she cut all the favourite birds and butterflies out and she had them pasted on the wall.
03:29So there's about 50 birds and butterflies that are stuck on as an addition.
03:33What's amazing is that this is a first edition of Audubon's book. And what she didn't know at
03:38the time is it would go on to become one of the most collectible books in the world.
03:42Oh, wow. And that means that this wallpaper is probably the most expensive wallpaper on
03:48public display in the world, which is quite a knack to make it up.
03:53We did have a specialist who came looking at Chinese art who told us that the spaces within
03:59the art that aren't filled are equally as important as the subject matter within that.
04:04And that's to give the piece a room so it can breathe. So when she looked at this wallpaper
04:09and she looked at the space, she thought, wow, this is a great space. And she thought,
04:13I'm going to put this piece in a room. And she thought, I'm going to put this piece in a room.
04:18So it can breathe. So when she looked at this wallpaper and she saw all the additions that
04:23Lady Hartford had done, she said that it just made the whole room feel suffocated.
04:27Bit of a cultural clash, maybe.
04:29Absolutely. They're coming together of East and West.
04:31So what can the wallpaper tell us about the relationships between the East and the West
04:35back then?
04:36So this wallpaper really talks about the luxury of those foreign imports. These were seen as hugely
04:42luxurious, desirable items.
04:44So it would have been hugely fashionable to have wallpaper like this?
04:47Yeah, absolutely. And Lady Hartford was known as a fashionista. She definitely,
04:52once decorated, used it to have tea ceremonies and all sorts of other bits and pieces.
05:00The desire for exotic items from the East was fueled by a European perception of China's
05:06cultural sophistication. And the aspiring upper classes couldn't get enough.
05:18Interestingly, wallpaper such as this was only produced for the growing Western demand.
05:31The Chinese themselves had no interest in such detailed wall coverings.
05:39The motifs in Chinese wallpaper were born out of a history of botanical study. The Chinese
05:46would make silk scrolls or paper scrolls, which were brought out for auspicious occasions and hung
05:51as decoration. But at some point, somebody looked at those scroll paintings and said,
05:57why don't we take this scroll, turn it on its side,
06:00put two or three next to each other, and paint one story across them?
06:06Some of the common symbols from earlier wallpapers included cranes for long life,
06:13pairs of birds for matrimonial harmony, peaches for health, and pomegranates for fertility.
06:20Of course, you know, Chinese wallpaper isn't an indigenous tradition.
06:24They didn't have this on their walls. It's a European confection.
06:30Almost every gleaming example of beautifully restored historic wallpaper
06:36in the UK and beyond owes its new life to one person.
06:41Very often, we are asked to go on site to these wonderful houses
06:44and very often conclude that in order to conserve it, it needs to come off the wall.
06:50This is very exciting. This is something that's just arrived. And this is fairly,
06:54fairly typical.
06:54A Christmas present. Where did this come from?
06:57This is from a private client.
06:59Look at that.
07:02Yeah, it's in quite a state, isn't it?
07:04Yeah. So yes, so this is the state that things often arrive to us.
07:09We get a lot of work from auction houses and antique dealers.
07:12How old would this be? Do we know?
07:13Well, this is 18th century as well. But, you know, we were talking about quality,
07:17but look at that.
07:18Amazing.
07:19Now you can see this has been patched. So this is a European section.
07:24It's not that beautiful Chinese wallpaper.
07:26If you have a look, it's really quite crude by comparison.
07:31So that's really interesting.
07:33We will start by surface cleaning it using one of these incredible conservation smoke
07:38sponges, which you can be very delicate with, but are very, very effective.
07:42And you can see you have got dirt there already.
07:45So very effective. And you can't just concentrate on one bit.
07:48You have to do the whole wall and then the whole wall again.
07:50Otherwise you get stripes and streaks.
07:51So again, even though that's such a simple technique,
07:55it needs years of experience to work out how to use it and use it well.
07:59We will strip it off all these backings and this will horrify you.
08:04We'll give it a wash.
08:05Oh, wow.
08:07We have huge silk screens that we lay them on and spray water through.
08:16Every single colour gets tested to make sure that it's not going to be affected by water.
08:21And we're going to do that with this one.
08:22So we're going to do that with this one.
08:24Every single colour gets tested to make sure that it's not going to be affected by water.
08:29And we work out the timings exactly.
08:31And then we line it onto paper as close to the original paper they would have used as possible.
08:36What's this made of?
08:37Handmade Chinese mulberry paper.
08:40Made from the inner bark of the mulberry tree.
08:42It's very soft.
08:43It is.
08:44And in washing it and treating it, it becomes like that again.
08:48You know, it gets its life back and its brilliance.
08:54And any retouching we do, we will do using the traditional materials.
08:58Beautiful malachite green.
09:00Fantastic crimson, which rarely survives on wallpaper because it's a delicate organic colour.
09:06I mean, look at the quality of painting.
09:08This is amazing.
09:09Isn't it exquisite?
09:09You can see all the tiny brush strokes.
09:11Yes, every single...
09:13I mean, this must have taken so long.
09:14It must have done.
09:24Over the past 40 years, Alison has worked on hundreds of antique wallpapers around the world,
09:31from historic houses to royal palaces.
09:37This example from Harewood House in the UK is unique.
09:41It depicts scenes of industry, such as the rise of the porcelain trade,
09:45moving away from the more traditional images of birds and butterflies.
09:49So a lot of these images initially were used because they had meaning.
09:53Clients were giving more detailed instructions.
09:56Could I see more pots?
09:57Or could I see more perspective, pagodas, buildings, figures?
10:05The traditional Chinese symbolism faded from the early papers
10:09and got replaced with objectism.
10:12More is more.
10:20As demand for this Chinese style of arts and decoration grew,
10:24the late 17th century saw the birth of a movement known as chinoiserie.
10:31If the world wants to buy Chinese taste, we'll give you Chinese taste locally.
10:38Originally pioneered by a collective of French artists,
10:42chinoiserie was the term for European art that imitated the Chinese style.
10:47And just as relevant today,
10:49the term covers a broad umbrella of Chinese art and design.
10:55Why do you think it stood the test of time?
10:57I mean, it's been around for so long.
10:59Well, it hasn't really.
11:00It's cyclical.
11:02So you had the 18th century passion for all things chinoiserie.
11:05Then it sort of died down a little bit at the beginning of the 19th century.
11:09Did it become unfashionable?
11:09Yeah.
11:11In the early 19th century,
11:12it was the Prince Regent that made it fashionable yet again.
11:15By the end of the 19th century,
11:17less and less people were doing Chinese wallpaper.
11:19Then it has a revival in the early 20th century,
11:22and it's ubiquitous.
11:23I mean, you know,
11:24every time you open one of the interior magazines,
11:27there's another room of Chinese wallpaper.
11:31Despite Alison's best efforts,
11:34these antique papers aren't going to last forever.
11:38So who's actually making them today?
11:41De Gournay is a firm of world-renowned luxury designers.
11:45Luxury wallpaper specialists.
11:48Everything you see here is hand-painted.
11:50Increasingly here, this is also embroidered.
11:53You want your wallpaper to be visually a treat for the senses.
12:02What's the original vision behind the company?
12:04That there was a gap in the market
12:06for creating the sorts of exotic interiors
12:09that the China trade helped wealthy industrialists
12:12and landed gentry in the 18th century create
12:14in the 20th century.
12:16Traditional in the sense that it has the same weight of design
12:18as the antique patterns.
12:20More was definitely more then.
12:22People liked design everywhere.
12:28The creative team at De Gournay
12:30worked closely with their clients,
12:32designing unique wallpaper installations
12:35that are then made in China,
12:37using traditional techniques such as the two-brush method.
12:42How similar is all of this
12:43to the ancient traditional Chinese wallpaper?
12:46In terms of what it's doing for the customer, identical.
12:49So we're transporting our viewer to another world
12:52in exactly the same way as those first 18th century clients
12:55wanted to transport their guests to another world.
13:00In order to validate your ability to make something,
13:02you've got to know how to perfectly copy an antique piece.
13:05But once you've learned how to copy it,
13:07and you can reproduce it,
13:09then you understand what it's...
13:12The Chinese would call it spirit resonance,
13:14but you understand what it's saying.
13:16Now, for us, the red line has always been
13:20that it had to be a paint material
13:22applied to a substrate with a brush by hand.
13:29De Gournay's work can be found
13:30at luxury properties across the world.
13:34Here at Beaver Castle,
13:35the team took inspiration from the historic Wellington Room,
13:39duly named after the Duke of Wellington's stay in 1850.
13:44Then, with a fresh colour scheme,
13:46the design was reimagined for the celebrated installation
13:49in the castle's Howard Room.
13:55Obviously, no design repeat.
13:57So we don't make rooms with design repeats.
14:03We're only ever showing you a fraction here.
14:06So this is just under a metre.
14:10How many artists would be working on each design?
14:14So, typically, one pattern would have a group of five artists
14:18at different skill levels,
14:20and the team would stay as a team together
14:22through the whole course of the project.
14:24It's interesting, isn't it,
14:25that people in China wouldn't see this as Chinese wallpaper?
14:29They would see it as Chinese-related imagery
14:32in a European wallpaper.
14:40If you'd asked me 30 years ago,
14:42could there be as many reinventions of the product,
14:46I would have struggled to believe it.
14:48However, now, having seen what our clients and customers have done,
14:52I think that we're a long way from the boundaries of limits yet.
14:57So our artisans, after a lifetime of pushing one material
15:02across silk or paper with a brush, are so skilled.
15:06We can't find that any more in Europe.
15:08We've lost those people.
15:09You know, the tide rarely goes out and stays out.
15:14De Gournay's mission is that these exquisite wall coverings
15:18will live a long life, becoming the antiques of the future.
15:23But with a luxury price tag
15:25and few qualified artists this side of the Great Wall,
15:29is this a style choice that's only available to the few?
15:32Hi! How are you doing?
15:35So my home is full to the brim of chinoiserie or Chinese wallpaper.
15:41Yeah.
15:42These two are like pigeons that you would find on a London street,
15:46but made beautiful, and these two are Victoria-crowned pigeons.
15:54Diane Hill is a London-based chinoiserie artist
15:57who has been working on her own for over 20 years.
16:00Diane Hill is a London-based chinoiserie artist and influencer.
16:05Several years ago, she travelled to China
16:08to learn the specialist art form direct from the masters,
16:11and is now putting her own spin on the movement.
16:14This is my bedroom.
16:16Look at this!
16:17So I'm really inspired by the antique Chinese wallpapers,
16:20and I wanted to create a modern version of this.
16:24So I used really bright, fresh colours,
16:27and I wanted to create something that was really readily available
16:31to everyone to buy on a roll.
16:33What were you thinking about when you painted it all?
16:35Like, I live for the summer,
16:37and I wanted it to feel like a fresh, bright summer's day.
16:41So like, you're waking up, no matter what time of year,
16:43it could be winter, you're waking up,
16:44and you have this feeling of being surrounded by nature,
16:48and I get ready and take my selfies,
16:50and I've got this in the background,
16:51like, making me feel really special.
16:53Yeah, it does!
16:57As well as selling bespoke paintings
17:00and producing her own line in printed wallpaper,
17:03Diane also teaches her craft to thousands of followers online.
17:09Do you want to draw, Ali?
17:11Yes!
17:12So this is a base coat.
17:14So now we're going to use two brushes.
17:17What is classically chinoiserie is like a perfect blend.
17:22The paint to do your shade,
17:24and then you're going to blend it with just water.
17:26So this brush just has water on it.
17:29You can see it blending already.
17:32And then you're using the water brush to just blend.
17:36It's like you're dyeing the silk paper
17:38instead of like painting on top of it,
17:40so it like sinks right into the paper like it's been dyed.
17:45The concentration of the paint is so important.
17:48Yeah, lovely!
17:49Oh, God, you see how you can get obsessed with this.
17:51I know, right?
17:53This is my favourite part,
17:55and this is the part that my audience responds to the best as well,
18:00because it looks super satisfying.
18:03It's not trying to look like a, you know, like a real leaf vein.
18:07It's something quite stylised about it.
18:09It really brings it out.
18:10Yeah, it really brings it out.
18:12It differs from the other ones,
18:13but it's a really, really beautiful piece.
18:15Really brings it out.
18:16Yeah, it really brings it out.
18:17It defines it.
18:19So when you're teaching people online, who's the audience?
18:23So I have two audiences.
18:26I have the artists who are really wanting to
18:30paint chamoiserie and learn from me,
18:32because I've obviously learned the techniques in China.
18:35That is my duty to do that, to share that.
18:38And then I have my collectors.
18:40You're doing really well!
18:42Oh, the shaky hand!
18:44How similar is this to what they would have done in the 1700s, 1800s?
18:49Yeah, so it would be almost exactly the same process,
18:52dragging the paint out with the water.
18:54I think we're basically ready for birds now.
19:07How do you want to leave your own personal mark on chinoiserie?
19:11Where do you want to take it?
19:12Chinoiserie, traditionally, was made for, I guess,
19:16the super rich, palaces, aristocrats, high-end stuff.
19:21This was not for normal people.
19:24And I have learned that skill.
19:26I am a normal person.
19:27I've learned that skill.
19:28And I just think there's so many people out there
19:31who really want to enjoy this.
19:33And so if I can put it onto a roll of wallpaper
19:37that you can just buy at the shops,
19:38and you can have a full effect like this
19:41and feel just like those women of the 18th century,
19:44then that's amazing.
19:49From Lady Hartford's cut-out birds
19:52to Diane's contemporary colours,
19:54it's clear that Chinese wallpaper is a form
19:57that will continue to be reimagined throughout the ages.
20:02I think there is a strong position for simply beautiful things.
20:07They are things that humans relate to very strongly,
20:10and they lift our spirits.
20:12When I walk into a room of Chinese wallpaper,
20:15it always blows me away.
20:16It's so exquisitely beautiful,
20:18and it has so many stories to tell.