William Morris frequently used tulips in his design for fabric and wallpaper. Here the small wild tulips form a mid ground with a foreground of ribbons of larger peonies intertwining with scrolling stems. Morris’s daughter May wrote how the character of this design was ‘all “Kelmscott” to me: the peony and the wild tulip are two of the richest blossomings of the spring garden at the Manor”. Kelmscott Manor was the Morris family’s country home in Oxfordshire.
Morris registered the design for ‘Wild Tulip’ wallpaper on 21st November 1884. The repeat is 64.8 x 26.7. This example in orange is printed down the right edge ‘MORRIS & Co Ltd REGISTERED No 175’ and pencilled in the right margin: ‘Wild Tulip 162 (price) 8/6’. Number 162 is the Morris & Co. colourway number for the salmon pink version of this wallpaper, other colourways were also available.
