Print Isn't Dead &mdash; It's Been Reborn As Wallpaper AT Europe

Genuine Fake Bookshelves wallpaper by Deborah Bowness and available at The Collection fooled me the first time I saw it a few years back at the Christian Lacroix-designed Hotel du Petit Moulin in the Marais. Lately it seems like the rise of digital media has given birth to a crop of print-inspired wallpapers, graphics and decorative objects to fill the void where actual books and magazines used to be...

Tracy Kendall's range of trompe l'oeil wallpaper includes Books, Paperbacks, Magazines and Newsprint.

This cardboard stool/side table and tray covered in images of German-language books from Virages are available via Decoclico.fr.

The lampe livre available at Home Autour du Monde is a ghostly stack of books that lights up the bedside.

I suppose this is just a modern take on the age-old phenomenon of books and magazines being used to make a statement on the shelf or coffee table. But in our clutter-fearing, blog-reading, Kindle-toting times, these images are beginning to take on the allure of gravestones.

- Kristin Hohenadel blogging from Paris. She can be reached at kristin @ apartmenttherapy . com

Comments (20)

Once again, I marvel at decorating weirdness. Someone who loves books will have lots of actual books in her/his home. Someone who relies on book-like props in place of actual reading material may as well look for a new decorating motif.

"...these images are beginning to take on the allure of gravestones. "

Did I just misread that? Or are you saying books have gone "out-of-style?"

In no way can a blog replace Henry Miller, or Hemingway.

I do not see books as merely a design element; they are tools for escape and expanding the mind. I am all about recycling books into art, like the books with carved pages. It just seems that you're saying the book is dead. I just think that is an outrageous statement.

As far as the Lacroix wallpaper, a hotel isn't the best place for a library so the idea is nice to set a mood. Otherwise, I'm not crazy about any of the other products.

HAHAHA.

I think the first picture might drive me crazy, but I don't see the big deal. What is the difference in decorating with a picture of book or a picture of a tree, bird, fleur de lis, etc..

I think the first picture is really cool and would love to do that in a tiny little nook in my home - if I had one (I am sadly nook-less, I live in one of those very open spaces)....but the other wallpaper with books? I'll take the real thing, thankyouverymuch, because then I could read too.

It's not the print of a book that we're kind of perturbed about, it's more of the idea of replacing books altogether because they are apparently not aesthetically cutting it anymore.

If you recall a post a while back by an interior decorator asking where she can find a ton of books for cheap to fill up her client's bookcases. I thought that was simply outrageous. The books a person reads tell so much about their personality, just as the art they hang. What kind of person wouldn't mind a bunch of random titles they've never read or heard of lining their walls?

I suppose it would be the same type of person who would rather have a table made of books than read them.

End rant. It's too early to be perturbed by silly things. I'm sorry.

As an avid reader, I *love* books. However, as the resident of a teeny, tiny apartment with little space for bookshelves, I just can't keep them around forever. I also recently moved overseas and had to get rid of a bazillion books.

I've been selling back the ones I've read (keeping a few special ones that I tend to re-read) at used bookstores so that I can buy new ones, but I really miss the presence of books in my space. The top image (which really is gorgeous in person imo) would be the perfect solution so my bookshelf-less life!

i got goosebumps from that first pic. Just creepy!

I love that first photo. Fantastic!

LOL I have that look without the wallpaper. But I find these amusing, and the book-lamp is punny. Punnish? Clever. Yeah, that's the word.

Kimber,
I rarely intervene here for obvious reasons, but if you think that the author of this post, who has made her living as a writer for many years, is advocating that books or other forms of print have gone "out of style," then you have missed my point.

My walls already look like that--except, you know, with actual books. The book lamp makes me smile, though.

Interesting post and comments. I LOVE my books so much that I find it a torment to perform an annual 'cull' (as my sister says). What I find fascinating about these accessories is that there are others out there paying loadsa $ and â‚¬ to create the look that I am trying to play down/disguise.

so interesting. I'm not even sure what to say except that it's cool in a weird way.

i'm a typeface junky so the one with the typeface and lamp speaks to me. :-)

:-D i have one of those cardboard stools :-)

i find the wallpapers funny, but like some of the above posters, i have that effect with real books.

Kristin, thank you for clearing that up! I'm glad I was wrong.

Book lover here. I have no lack of books to cover walls, but I do find the wallpaper so charming! The pic is a great example for using it. It adds a good dose of drama to an unlikely awkward niche space that might otherwise go unnoticed and would certainly not be able to accommodate that many books without losing significant physical depth.

The lamp is quite sweet too.