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It's her writing on that wall

After a hiatus, wallpaper is making a comeback. A South Tampa artist rolls out her own eclectic designs.

By ELIZABETH BETTENDORF
Published September 8, 2006

TAMPA - Love it, hate it, wallpaper is back - with style.

Over the past year, it's been stealing the spotlight in the design world, from textured antique reproductions that can be painted to match any interior to new patterns with a bold, modernist flair.

Before you groan and recall nightmarish days spent peeling sheets of pink peonies from Laura Ashley-era walls, take heed.

The look of wallpaper has changed:

Think clean-lined, thoroughly modern patterns that can transform the look of both traditional and contemporary decors.

"I've always been a fan of modern design from furniture to dishes, and I wanted to design wallpaper with that same feel," said Given Campbell, a South Tampa artist whose wallpaper designs are carried by top companies around the country.

Her patterns look like ultra-mod garden trellises, '70s designer blouse patterns, dog bones, connect-a-dots and swirly-Qs. Her colors are confident but cool, and James Bond in feel, though they work well in different styles of homes and an assortment of rooms, including nurseries.

"I'm printing some right now for a small powder room in a home in Boston," she explained.

Her simple, streamlined patterns - many featured on her Web site, www.givencampbell.com - have names such as Curve, Villa, XO, Coffee Bean, Swirl and Query.

Campbell, 35, also works as a massage therapist at a South Tampa day spa for men, the Difference, on Henderson Boulevard. Still she spends hours each day printing paper by hand at the Manhattan Avenue studio that she shares with her boyfriend, Miguel Insignares, 33, a commercial comic book artist.

Campbell's work was featured in numerous home magazines this past spring and winter, including Shelter, Modernism and House and Garden's June issue. Her designs will also be featured in an upcoming issue of Romantic Home and a kids' rooms edition of Better Homes and Gardens.

Her smaller line of cool, soothing, spa-inspired wallpaper has been featured in American Spa and Massage and Body Work magazines.

"I'm really hoping to eventually support myself with this," she said. "I want to be a wallpaper superstar - the Vera Wang of wallpaper."

Campbell, who attended a community college with a strong art program in her native Norfolk, Va., had been searching for an outlet for her strong graphic style for years.

"I knew I wanted to design things for the home, barware or bedding," she recalled, "so I started looking at shower curtains, but you had to buy something like 30,000 at a time."

She began designing wallpaper a few years ago after noticing the first ripples of renewed interest. She managed to get several manufacturers, including Studio Printworks and Wolf Gordon, to license or buy her designs.

The interest in her work rides the coattails of a renewed interest in wallpaper after a decadelong trend of faux finishing and other paint techniques. At its best, wallpaper is an easy way to give an uninteresting room a bit of architectural flair, even add brightness or panache to a drab or dark space, like an under-the-stairs powder room.

Wallpaper is more touchable - with lots of textured varieties such as grasscloth - and more up-to-date in its application. Designs, as well as color palettes, are often drawn from nature rather than the fashion runways. Look for colors like dark green and brick in updated toile and floral prints, as well as murals such as a palm-tree island image from Waverly's Coronado collection, www.waverly.com.

Still, it's not for everyone. Temple Terrace interior decorator Priscilla Castellano said that her clients often roll their eyes at the thought of putting up wallpaper, especially if they've just struggled to remove three layers of the stuff. "A lot of people say they're just over it," she said.

Castellano uses wallpaper sparingly - on an accent wall or in a tiny powder room, where covering the walls can create a stunning effect.

According to the national Wallcoverings Association, wallcovering is easy to install if you follow the manufacturer's instructions. The organization's Web site offers lots of helpful tips, www.wallcoverings.org.

So far, Campbell has created 43 wallpaper designs. She keeps about 22 in production at a time.

She works at one of two long tables in her studio, spreading out sheets of blank wallpaper that she stencils to paint on patterns.

She officially rolled out her products last year, never dreaming they would drum up so much interest.

"I wanted to have a complete line I could send out as a collection," Campbell said. "Now I have a collection that I love and think is beautiful."

Elizabeth Bettendorf can be reached at ebettendorf@hotmail.com

[Last modified September 6, 2006, 11:23:10]