Picking the perfect wallpaper for a kitchen

Which wallpaper is best for a kitchen?

The kitchen, as one of the most heavily used rooms in a home, is a room that has to be functional as well as looking stunning.

The kitchen is a room that you spend a lot of time in as well as where you prepare meals and snacks everyday. It is a space that needs to feel comfortable, inviting, and clean.

A kitchen can be a complicated space to style, if you have many large appliances that cover your walls, minimising space.

Not to fear, we have some great suggestions to get you on the right path to choosing the perfect wallpaper for your kitchen!

Material

One of the most important facets when picking a wallpaper for the kitchen, is choosing the right material.

The kitchen is an environment where moisture occurs naturally during cooking and cleaning and it’s best to pick a material that won’t be damaged by moisture or steam

Printing your design on a wallpaper that is solid vinyl will help solve a lot of these issues. Solid vinyl is more durable than something like paper backed vinyl, which can be damaged if cleaned or wiped down.

Solid vinyl wallpaper will allow you to clean the surface gently without damaging the design. It is also far more resistant to water, and has a better lifetime when e
xposed to sunlight.

Sometimes, patterns and designs can fade from extended exposure to strong sunlight, but solid vinyl will help mitigate this issue.

Some other materials that you could consider for wallpaper include: matte smooth material, canvas material (for a textured look and feel), ritz canvas texture, paper finish vinyl and gloss vinyl finish. For a breakdown of each option’s look and feel you can check out this section in our Ultimate Guide to Picking the Perfect Wallpaper, or the materials page on our website. While these materials might not be ideal for the entire kitchen, they may work well for a feature wall or to help achieve a specific vision you have in mind for the wallpaper for your kitchen.

Colour

A kitchen is a shared space, so it’s common to choose colours that can be widely appreciated. It is a good idea to choose slightly more neutral colours to ensure the space appeals to all who use it.

It’s also an environment littered with decor elements to factor into your design. Sleek appliances, often silver or white in colour, specific styles of fixtures such as drawer & cupboard handles, as well as, things like lights can be good guides for the direction in which to take your kitchen theme.

Clients often choose more neutral colours that will blend well with the rest of the room, and the colours of your cupboards, fixtures and appliances.

To add a spark to your approach, you can pair these more placid tones with a textured material to print on, which will create an intriguing feel. A popular example here is pairing neutral tones like shades of grey, with a textured printing material to create a design with that catches the eye and has a tangible texture.

Blues and greens are also a popular choice to use in the kitchen, and provide a fresh look and feel that contrasts well with a more standard colour scheme for the rest of the kitchen, with cream tones and silver fixtures.

To contrast the base theme of a kitchen and it’s modern, placid colour scheme, use wall stickers to add splashes of colour and intricate patterns that will liven up your kitchen space. You can also limit these stickers to a specific space really easily, and it’s a stunning way to decorate splashbacks above a kitchen stove.

Splashbacks are often overlooked as a space to decorate. While cooking, you’re likely to spill and splash drops of food and moisture onto the wall space behind your stovetop or washbasin. It’s a part of your wall that can get dirty quite quickly, and this might hold you back from adding some style to this empty tiled space.

Using wall stickers to style small splashback segments is great. It adds energy to the space, contrasting classic kitchen colour schemes and the best part – you can wipe them down easily when cleaning and they’re easily replaceable if you’d like to switch to a different style in the future.

What makes wall tile stickers so versatile?

Wall tile stickers allow you to add pops of patterns and colour to existing wall tiles.

This is an inexpensive way to style portions of your kitchen, particularly splashbacks. Wall tile stickers are easy to clean, and can easily be removed and replaced if damaged.

Traditionally, to alter the style of your wall tiles, you would need to remove the current tiles you have on the wall and reinstall a new decorative style. This can set you back thousands of rand, for a design you may fall out of love with in a few months or a year.

With wall tile stickers, you can mix and match from different collections to create your own personal design for your splashback, or apply one collection to stick to a specific theme.

Wall tile stickers are a fraction of the cost of replacing tiles, and there are tons of styles to choose from. Whether you’re into floral designs, abstract repeat patterns, vibrant colours, placid tones, or you want to replicate a material like stone, or marble – there’s a wide variety of wall stickers to suit your style.

Picking the right pattern and our popular kitchen wallpaper patterns

The idea behind picking patterns for the kitchen, is to spruce up the space. Kitchens are inherently functional and they are a space you will share with friends, family and guests.

Having a plain colour scheme can limit the experience you create in this part of your home, and it might leave your kitchen looking far less decorative and stunning than other rooms in residential or commercial space.

Abstract patterns in short bursts provide exactly what you need, when your kitchen is feeling a little bland. Positano tiles, with their repetitive blue patterns, are really popular for this kind of approach, featuring intricate, appealing patterns and a range of vibrant tones.

Another great idea is to choose a pattern that you know you can pair with accessories you’ll use in the kitchen such as oven gloves, aprons, tea towels, tableware, trays and coasters. To fit this need, Skinny Laminx is a popular choice for our clients.

Skinny Laminx creates a range of functional kitchen and homeware accessories that also look stunning, and pair beautifully with our collection of Skinny Laminx wallpapers.

The collection consists of intriguing, funky patterns that provide a lively & fresh feel for the kitchen. Choose your preferred colour scheme and between a variety of geometric or organic patterns that work well on horizontal and vertical plains.

Another popular choice, is the Crayola Collection by Sara Ord.

The collection includes some really abstract brush-stroke style patterns with a great deal of movement. This movement creates a lively atmosphere which provides the perfect contrast for a kitchen with a clean theme and colour scheme.

This kind of pattern definitely showcases personality, and while it could be used throughout the kitchen, it’s often best suited for adding a spark to smaller open segments of wall.

Maximising creativity on small surfaces

Sometimes, it can be hard to decide what to do with those smaller surfaces. How can I add style? Am I able to wallpaper such a small surface, instead of a whole wall? And what sort of design will be most effective in a small space?

You can style a small space – and you should. It’s the perfect way to add an extra splash of colour, pattern, and additional wallpaper and decor that compliments your theme.

It’s often easier to choose a pattern or style for a small surface, as you can make it more personalised and bring across part of your personality.

You can apply these kinds of patterns with wall tile stickers or by printing/commissioning a wallpaper design, however they will both influence your budget differently, as wall tile stickers are less expensive.

When it comes to colours and imagery, it’s a great idea to bring in some of your own personal taste or work within the theme you currently have and push the boundaries a little further.

If you enjoy nature and vibrant colours, you could try a repeat pattern with illustrations of plants and wildlife. Delicate illustrations will often appear funky, and lighthearted, which is a great atmosphere to create in the kitchen – particularly in the morning. Pair this imagery with some vibrant greens, blues, oranges and yellows, and you’ll have a repeat pattern that creates some much needed energy on a Monday morning.

A popular pick is still large tree fronds with big leaves, as they convey the theme of nature and the larger elements that repeat within the pattern, contrast chaotic repeat patterns with smaller elements that repeat frequently

You can also choose to work around the obstacles present by appliances in the kitchen.

Here’s an example:

We decided to utilise the most important segment of the wall for this chic coffee inspired illustration, and create a vanishing effect behind the portion of the wall that will remain obstructed by the fridge.

Working around the appliances you plan to install and as well as the theme of the fixtures you’ve chosen, if you haven’t designed a theme from start to finish – before you’ve added cupboards, shelves, appliances, and fixtures like handles and lights.

Showcasing your personal side

Although generally a kitchen is a space shared by a couple, family, loved ones and friends – incorporating something from your personal side can be endearing and create a distinct personality for your space.

It also means this is an environment you’ll love even more, and especially if you spend vast amounts of time creating delicious dishes, desserts and baked items – and you’re obsessed with food.

Have a look for some of these food inspired wallpapers.

The photography captures the essence of baking in the first image, and the red hues present in the seeds of the pomegranate in the second image create kitchen space that feels appetising. The dark wood composing part of the kitchen’s theme, is nicely complimented by the saturated red pomegranate seeds too.

If you’re feeling stuck with how to approach your wallpaper design – which materials to use and picking the ideal wallpapers for a variety of spaces, you can visit our blog page for some great suggestions.

Our articles provide some suggestions on picking wallpapers for spaces such as the bathroom, bedroom, a hotel lobby, restaurant or you can start out with Our Ultimate Guide to Picking the Perfect Wallpaper for some in-depth general guidelines.

We also welcome any inquiries to assist you in creating the ideal wallpaper experience for any space.

To chat about your vision, email us or give our team a call to book a consultation and we’ll see how we can bring your dream design to life.