Powder Room Wallpaper Without Regret: How to Choose the One You'll Still Love in Five Years

If you've been collecting wallpaper samples for months (or even years) you're not behind. You just want to get it right. It's ok to be careful with these kinds of decisions. I want you to turn those samples into a decision that will be a loved and timeless addition to your home.

So here is a whole powder room (or half bath/powder bath, whatever yours is called) that I've imagined up for you. I've rendered my Huckleberry Thief wallpaper pattern on all the walls along with a walnut vanity, brass fixtures, and a washable rug. Every piece is affordable and listed below with links. And if you want to see the wallpaper in your own room before you decide a single thing, I'll get you one of our 24 x 12 inch swatches shipped free to your front door.

Powder room rendering: my Huckleberry Thief wallpaper in Glacier Sage, shown at true scale on all walls. Scroll down to see the swatch for exact color and detail.

The wallpaper: Huckleberry Thief in Glacier Sage

William Morris' classic Strawberry Thief pattern is one of my favorites. I wanted to imagine if Morris was inspired by the Mountain Bluebirds and native flora of the Rocky Mountain Northwest, instead of the English countryside, what would that pattern look like? So my homage to his timeless Arts and Crafts style is Huckleberry Thief: one of my favorite patterns I've created to date. Mountain bluebirds sit in facing pairs on the branches with a berry in each beak. Around them are native plants of my homeland, laid out in the same symmetry.

Glacier Sage is the soothing colorway: sky-blue birds on a soft sagey-gray-green ground, with wheat-gold and pale coral in the flowers and berries. It's the one that interior designers specify when they want to pattern drench a whole room and have that room feel calm and timeless.

If blues and sages aren't your room, this same pattern comes in three other colorways: First Light on cream, Harvest Trail on warm ochre, and Timberline Dark on deep forest green. See Glacier Sage or see all four.

Will I still love it in five years?

That's the real question under every wallpaper question, so let's answer it first.

William Morris drew Strawberry Thief allll the way back in 1883 after watching thrushes steal fruit from his garden. It's still in production, and people are still hanging it on their walls today, a hundred and forty years later. Not because it's trendy. Because birds and berries and leaves and nature are what we as humans have always wanted to look at. Nature doesn't go out of style and neither do solid design principles.

That's the whole case for an Arts and Crafts pattern in a room you're want to do once. This classic style takes its shapes from nature and its structure from human craft. Both of those things have watched decorating trends be born and then fade away over hundreds of years. When a pattern is drawn from a real place like the English countryside or the Rocky Mountain Northwest, it belongs to that place, not to the year it was created. I wrote more about why this style holds up in a modern house in Arts & Crafts Wallpaper for Modern Homes, if you want to learn more about that.

The short version: you don't get tired of a huckleberry patch, or the whimsy of bluebirds. That feeling never falls out of fashion.

But what if...?

Everyone who's spent a year with a drawer full of samples knows the worries that come along with installing wallpaper for the first time. Here's how this room, and this particular wallpaper pattern even, can answer them.

1. "What if I can't install it, or can't find anyone who can?"
You choose the pattern first and the material second, and we can print every pattern on four materials so the material can match your house and your lifestyle. For a powder room, the one I'd start with is Pre-Pasted. It's water-activated, so a first-time installer can adjust it on the wall, and it's the material most paper hangers are happiest to see. There's a step-by-step Pre-Pasted install guide if you're doing it yourself, and a short note further down on how to talk to a pro if you're not.

2. "What if I can't get it off, or it wrecks my walls?"
Our Pre-Pasted paper is fully removable, with no time limit attached. Taking it down is simply spritzing it with warm water, waiting a few minutes, and peeling it off. The thing that makes that easier too is a primer you put on before the install: two coats, each dried overnight, then a four-week cure.

3. "What if it's too much at full-room scale?"
This is the fear a photo can't settle, so here are the numbers for Huckleberry Thief. The repeat is 24 inches wide and about 25 tall. The wall behind the vanity in the room above is a little under four feet wide, which means you're seeing the pattern exactly twice across it, and each big bluebird is about seven inches long, roughly half the length of a vanity drawer. Our swatch is 24 by 12 inches, a full width of the repeat, so when you tape it up you're seeing the pattern at its real size, not the postage-stamp version. 

4. "What if it's too expensive for a small room?"
A powder room is the smartest place in the house to start with wallpaper: a few rolls make the entire room. Every guest sees it. Our pre-pasted paper is easy to install. I've calculated the numbers for you below as an example.

5. "What if I order the wrong amount, or can't match it later?"
Our handy wallpaper calculator on every product page works out the rolls for your walls with the repeat built in, so you get a solid answer. Don't deduct for the vanity, the toilet or the mirror; the pattern match eats the difference. Order one extra anyway. 

There's a sixth worry nobody puts on the list, but it lives in your subconscious... 'What will everyone think?" I'll come back to that one.

Should you wallpaper the whole powder room or just one wall?

All four. 

The accent wall feels like the cautious choice, and in a bedroom it can be. In a powder room it does the opposite of what you want: one papered wall in a five-by-seven room reads as unfinished. You'll notice it every time you walk in, and it will bug you. Once the vanity and the toilet are in, the pattern settles into the background of the room and stops being the subject of it.

Wallpaper on the ceiling is the version you'll see on Pinterest under "pattern drenching." It's lovely and it's optional. The room above keeps a painted ceiling and white trim, which is the version most installers quote first and the easiest one to live with.

What type of wallpaper is best for a powder room?

For a powder room with no shower, Pre-Pasted wallpaper is the material to start with, and PVC-Free Type II is the upgrade if you're hiring the install and want the wallpaper to stand up against moisture and steam. Two of our four materials make sense here. I'll be plain about the third.

Pre-Pasted, $115 a roll. My recommendation for a powder room. Breathable, and rated by our manufacturer as mold and mildew resistant, which is what you want in a room with a sink and maybe no window. It's class A fire rated, PVC-free, and fully removable. It removes better with a properly primed wall.

PVC-Free Type II, $145 a roll. The heavier, commercial-grade version of the same design, the one we often specify for hotels and public spaces, and perfect for permanent residential installs. If you're hiring a wallpaper installer and you want to do this room once and forget about it, this is the upgrade to ask about.

Peel & Stick, $149 a roll. Self-adhesive and repositionable. Our manufacturer rates it for short-term use, up to about a year, with full removal inside that window. It isn't suited to high-moisture rooms though. A powder room with no shower is a dry room, so it can work here as well.

Wallpapers generally want a smooth, flat wall. If yours has orange peel or knockdown texture, that's a liner and a skim coat first, and a conversation with your installer before you order. Not sure which material you need? Take the quiz.

Shop the whole look

Why I chose these pieces

Everything else is plain. The walls carry the room, so nothing else needs to have a print except the rug, and the rug is small and low. Walnut, brass, white ceramic, woven grass.

The mirror is as wide as the vanity. A big round mirror on a patterned wall gives your eye a place to rest and shows a peek of the pattern behind you, which makes a small room feel deeper. A small mirror on a wallpapered wall looks like it's hiding in the huckleberry bushes.

Light comes from the sides. Sconces at eye level flanking the mirror are kinder to faces and warmer on the paper than a row of light bulbs above it.

Faux greenery is fine here. No window, no plant that will die from lack of sunlight. Nobody has ever checked.

The rug goes in the washer. Choose a washable rug, it's just so much easier.

Installation and how to remove wallpaper without damaging your walls

Do it yourself, or hire it? A powder room is the hardest small room to paper: tight corners, a toilet in the way, a mirror and two sconces to cut around. If you've hung wallpaper before, it's a weekend. If you haven't, this is a good room to hire out, and there's no shame in that.

Humidity, in one sentence. A powder room with no shower or tub is a dry room, and Pre-Pasted is rated for exactly this kind of room, which is hand washing and the occasional steamy guest. Ha.

Removal, in one sentence. Pre-Pasted comes down the way it went up, with warm water and patience, and the primer you put on first is what keeps the drywall from coming with it.

If your walls are textured, your paint is fresh, or your house is old. Texture needs a liner. Paint less than a month old needs to finish curing before primer goes on, or the paper bubbles. Older plaster is usually fine but wants a careful look for hairline cracks first. None of these are reasons not to paper; they're the things to tell your installer before they quote.

How much does it cost to wallpaper a powder room?

For a typical 5 by 7 powder room, the paper runs about $1,380 in Pre-Pasted and a professional install is usually more than that, so plan on the room as a whole rather than the rolls alone. The furnishings above come to $794.87 with the vanity, faucet, mirror, sconces and door knob, or $265.98 for the soft goods and decor if your fixtures are staying.

Wallpaper is the bigger number, and it's the one worth spending well. Rolls are 24 inches wide by 12 feet long, and with this repeat one roll gives you one full-height drop on a standard 8 foot wall. A powder room around 5 by 7 feet has about 24 feet of wall, which is twelve drops, so twelve rolls. Don't deduct for the vanity, the toilet or the mirror. If you deduct anything, deduct the door.

• Pre-Pasted: 12 rolls, $1,380.
• PVC-Free Type II: 12 rolls, $1,740. The 27 foot roll runs cheaper per foot; the calculator shows it when it wins.
• Peel & Stick: 12 rolls, $1,788.

Then the installer. The quotes homeowners share online for a powder room run from about $800 to $1,600, labor only, with the toilet out. Get two local quotes and be suspicious of the one that's half the other. That's the strange part of selling wallpaper: the paper is the smaller line, which is exactly why it's worth buying the one you love rather than the one that's fifteen dollars cheaper.

Our wallpaper calculator with the repeat built in works out the rolls for your exact walls and shows you the cheaper roll option. It's also on every product page.

The five-year test

Three questions, answered honestly, on the day your swatch arrives. No forum vote required.

• Would I still choose this if it weren't trending everywhere right now? (A bluebird in a huckleberry patch is not trending everywhere. It's just... outside.)
• Would I still choose it if no stranger got to vote?
• Does it feel like my house, or like I'm borrowing someone else's?

Three yeses and you're done deciding. Two yeses and a maybe, tape the swatch up for another week.

About that sixth worry

If you keep coming back to one design, that's your answer. The powder room is the one room where you get to choose the print you actually love, where four walls of it is the calm choice rather than the brave one, and where the only opinion that has to live with it is yours. Nobody else gets a vote. You're allowed.

Common questions

Will I get tired of it? Patterns drawn from nature tend to age the way a garden does, which is to say they don't. Morris's bird patterns from the 1880s are still hanging in new houses. The ones people tire of are the ones tied to a moment.

Is peel and stick "cheap"? No, but it's a different tool. Ours is a good non-woven paper with a self-adhesive back, rated for about a year of use. For a rental it's the right answer. For a powder room you own, Pre-Pasted or PVC-Free Type II is the better long-term choice.

How many rolls do I need for a powder room? Count your drops: wall width in inches divided by 24, rounded up, per wall. A typical 5 by 7 powder room with 8 foot ceilings is about twelve drops, so twelve 12 foot rolls. The calculator on each product page does this with the repeat built in.

What if I can't find an installer? Search "wallpaper installer" plus your town rather than "painter"; many painters won't hang paper. Ask if they've done powder rooms with the toilet out, and send them the install guide for the material you chose before they quote.

Can you use peel and stick wallpaper in a bathroom? In a powder room with no shower, yes, though for a room you own we'd point you to Pre-Pasted instead. In a full bath with a shower or tub, no: Peel & Stick isn't suited to high-moisture rooms.

Is bird wallpaper too much for a bathroom? Not in a powder room. The birds in Huckleberry Thief are about seven inches long on a mid-tone ground, so from the doorway they read as pattern first and birds second. The room above has them on all four walls and still feels calm.

Is wallpaper okay in a powder room with humidity? Yes, if there's no shower or tub. Pre-Pasted is rated mold and mildew resistant and breathable. A full bath with a shower is a different conversation, and Peel & Stick isn't suited to high-moisture rooms at all.

Start with a swatch

A photograph of wallpaper is a photograph of someone else's light. Yours is different, and a powder room's light is usually one warm bulb and nothing else. Tape a real piece to the wall at eye level, look at it from the hallway with the door open, and look again at night with the sconces on. Hold it next to your paint chip and your vanity sample. That's the whole test, and it costs less than lunch.

Swatches are 24 by 12 inches, a full width of the repeat, on the same exact material as the roll, and they ship free. Order one and I'll email you a $20 credit toward your first roll order of $200 or more. Order four of anything and 15% comes off automatically; the three sets below are the ones I'd send you if you asked.

Order a Glacier Sage swatch in Pre-Pasted, $9
Order a Glacier Sage swatch in PVC-Free Type II, $12
See all swatches

Every pattern I create is drawn by my own two hands here at my studio in Idaho and printed to order in the USA. If you've been carrying samples around for a while, order the one you keep looking at. Then tape it up and let the room tell you. 🩶