China at Harewood

The East Bedroom at Harewood House near Leeds, home to the Queen’s cousin the Earl of Harewood has been restored and redecorated with exquisite hand-painted Chinese wallpaper dating back to the 1760s. The wallpaper, which is now on view to the general public for the first time, provides a dazzling centrepiece to the ‘China at Harewood’ exhibition.

Depicting scenes of Chinese life, the wallpaper was ‘lost’ for over 150 years until 1988, when around twenty rolls were rediscovered in a carpenter’s loft in one of the outbuildings on the Harewood Estate. Subsequent research has shown that the rolls form a completed scheme thought likely to have been commissioned by Edwin Lascelles and installed in 1769 in the Chintz Bedroom as part of the decoration of the then newly built Harewood House.

In the mid 1990s the rolls of wallpaper were conserved to a level that would allow them to be stored for future use. With the aid of financial grants, restoration work on the wallpaper has now been carried out in Gloucestershire by the country’s foremost historic wallpaper conservator Allyson McDermott, who has said that in her opinion “It is possibly one of the best examples of Chinese wallpaper anywhere in the world. The colours are wonderful and the quality of painting extraordinary. What Harewood has is something wonderful and unique”.

The wallpaper would have originally been complemented by Chinese-style ‘Japanned’ furniture supplied by Thomas Chippendale. The commode has been restored and can be seen alongside the clothes press and night stands in the East Bedroom. Chippendale’s Chinese Mirror, designed to go with the paper, also hangs in the room and is displayed for the first time.

The conservation and rehanging of the wallpaper has been made possible by a grant of £83,300, jointly funded by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and the Wolfson Foundation, with further financial support being provided by the Esmeé Fairbairn Foundation with a grant of £38,900 and the European Commission.

The ‘China at Harewood’ exhibition continues throughout 2008.

For more information, visit Harewood.org.