Bruce Fine Papers was established in 1994 by Alex Bruce and has remained a small bespoke family business to the core. Joined by his wife Naomi as Directors of the company they employ two generations of family to produce bespoke and traditional hand-block printed wallpapers from a historic workshop in Lincolnshire.
No project is too small or too big and no design style out of reach as Bruce Fine Papers prides itself on allowing a fully bespoke and customisable service to suit the individual client's needs. From working with clients to produce original wallpaper designs, restoring heritage designs from fragments and colour matching by eye to a client's chosen colour scheme, the emphasis on the handmade sits at the very heart of the process allowing an adaptable creative service that produces a truly high-end and bespoke product.
The Bruce Fine Papers Collection comes from over a quarter of a century of working in the interior design and wallpaper industry and covers a breadth of design styles and colourways that reflects the variety present within the small team. From restoring heritage designs back onto the market as well as stepping out and creating original contemporary designs it is a celebration of the history and heritage of the hand block printed craft alongside its longevity and adaptability as a high-end interior decoration.
"The Bruce Fine Papers Collection as a whole team effort is the best representation of our style. But what is imperative is celebrating the opportunities and creativity within the hand-blocked print. From sticking close to historic roots to pushing the boundaries to produce contemporary and creative designs there are endless possibilities available through the use of design and colour. Our colourways aim to showcase each design in a variety of ways using the medium of colour to change the feel and style of the design, giving a historic paper place in a contemporary studio and vice versa."
"The heritage projects that come to us are always an opportunity to engage in one of our favourite parts of the company. The restoration and recreation of historic designs for various historic properties worldwide.
The latest project has been with the Derbyshire Historic Buildings Trust and was one of our most challenging projects yet. In the planned restoration of the South Wingfield Station, the Derbyshire Historic Buildings Trust discovered 5 layers of original wallpaper in existence behind a picture dado rail that ran the length of the room. This dado rail had protected these fragments from redecorations and preserved a 7cm wide strip of design. They came to us with the request of reproducing one of these wallpapers for the restoration of their property.
The wallpaper that they chose for the restoration was the earliest paper within the layers, the small print Georgian style damask design 5 layers back. Wanting to preserve as much of each of the 5 designs as possible we had three small sections of the original design to work from.
With very little to work with our resident artwork designer Ellie Bruce reconstructed the original design using and adapting elements that were present with the fragments to visualise how the original pattern would have extended. Drawing upon her 9 years in wallpaper reconstruction and from the sources of similar designs from the corresponding period she created a full repeating pattern from the 7cm wide strips and restored this small Georgian damask back onto the market.
The production team colour matched by eye to the original sample to produce the correct colours for the reconstruction and traditionally hand block printed 16 rolls of the wallpaper for the restoration."
