
However, tapestries were extremely expensive and so only the very rich could afford them. These tapestries added color to the room as well as providing an insulating layer between the stone walls and the room, thus retaining heat in the room. The social elite continued to hang large tapestries on the walls of their homes, as they had in the Middle Ages. Wallpaper, using the printmaking technique of woodcut, gained popularity in Renaissance Europe amongst the emerging gentry. The first three all date back to before 1700. The main historical techniques are: hand-painting, woodblock printing (overall the most common), stencilling, and various types of machine-printing. The traditional hand-blocking technique, France in 1877 A single pattern can be issued in several different colorways. The number of times the pattern repeats horizontally across a roll does not matter for this purpose. In the case of large complex patterns of images this is normally achieved by starting the second piece halfway into the length of the repeat, so that if the pattern going down the roll repeats after 24 inches, the next piece sideways is cut from the roll to begin 12 inches down the pattern from the first. Patterned wallpapers are designed so that the pattern "repeats", and thus pieces cut from the same roll can be hung next to each other so as to continue the pattern without it being easy to see where the join between two pieces occurs. Wallpaper is made in long rolls which are hung vertically on a wall. Wallpaper printing techniques include surface printing, gravure printing, silk screen-printing, rotary printing, and digital printing. The smallest rectangle that can be tiled to form the whole pattern is known as the pattern repeat. Wallpapers can come plain as "lining paper" (so that it can be painted or used to help cover uneven surfaces and minor wall defects thus giving a better surface), textured (such as Anaglypta), with a regular repeating pattern design, or, much less commonly today, with a single non-repeating large design carried over a set of sheets. It is usually sold in rolls and is applied onto a wall using wallpaper paste. Wallpaper is a material used in interior decoration to decorate the interior walls of domestic and public buildings. Various examples of samples of wallpapers
