Decorating With Acanthus: Colour Palettes and Room Pairings

The look of Acanthus in one paragraph

Acanthus is a pattern of acanthus scrolls, dense and scrolling, built from a single repeated leaf form. The Victoria and Albert Museum holds an original design for the wallpaper, made by William Morris in England in 1874, worked in pencil, watercolour and bodycolour on paper, and the V&A dates the wallpaper itself to 1875. The 1874 object is a working drawing on the same scale as the finished wallpaper, made as a guide for the printer when matching colours, and it does not show the whole pattern. That matters for decorators: the design you hang is a fragment of a much larger repeat.

In practical terms, expect a big, leafy pattern with visual weight. It is not a light, scattered motif. If you want more on how the design came to be, our page on the Acanthus wallpaper covers the making history separately.

Why the darker colours matter for your palette

According to the Victoria and Albert Museum, Acanthus was the first wallpaper in a group of large-scale heavy patterns printed in darker colours, more sophisticated than the earlier papers, in which Morris successfully disguised the underlying geometric structure of the repeat. The V&A also notes that in the mid-1870s Morris moved away from his earlier style of small-scale patterns. Acanthus sits at that turning point.

For your palette, that points to depth rather than brightness. Treat the dark leaf tones as your anchor colour, then pick one quieter secondary colour from the print and keep walls, curtains and large furniture in plain, muted shades. The pattern carries the room, so the rest of the scheme should recede. If you are building a whole-house approach, our room-by-room system for decorating with Morris prints sets out that same principle across designs.

Reading the drawing: colour notes and highlights

The working drawing is not a colour reference you can copy exactly. The printer added pencil notes with instructions and questions about the colours to the drawing, so what you see on the sheet is a document of negotiation, not the final printed scheme. Some features were also left out of the printed version, such as the white highlights on the scrolling leaf at the top.

The lesson for decorators is simple: judge a print by the printed colours in front of you, not by reproductions of the painted study. The V&A describes the drawing as a guide for the printer when matching colours, made on the same scale as the wallpaper, which is why painted and printed versions can read differently. Compare prints in the light of your own room before committing. You can read more on the drawing on our Acanthus wallpaper page.

Size, scale and placement

Because Acanthus is large scale, the placement rule is one focal area with plain surroundings. The V&A's account of the design, first of the large-scale heavy patterns and moved away from small-scale work in the mid-1870s, tells you the repeat was meant to read boldly. A fragment of a big repeat gives more impact than the same pattern spread thinly across every surface.

In practice, hang one large framed piece as the focal point, or restrict wallpaper to a single wall. Keep the adjacent wall, floor and large furniture quiet so the scrollwork reads clearly. The same rule holds for smaller prints: one strong piece beats several competing ones.

Choosing an Acanthus print for your room

Our current prints with acanthus-style leaf scrollwork fall into four colour directions. Each is described by its title only, since we confirm design names against museum records before naming them. The suggested rooms below are styling suggestions, not historical claims. Browse the full collection to see how these sit alongside other patterns.

One further print sits outside the table: the Cream Lilac Acanthus Poppy Arts And Crafts print, whose title names cream and lilac tones with poppy forms. As with the prints above, we describe it by its title only and name the design once the record confirms it.

What the record does and does not tell us

Honesty about sources shapes how far this guide can go. The V&A record is our single source for the design's history, and no period styling advice from Morris himself about Acanthus survives in the material we hold, so every pairing above is editorial, not historical. The record of what was omitted from the printed version is also incomplete; we know the white highlights on the scrolling leaf at the top were dropped, but the full list is not available to us.

Attribution needs care too. According to the V&A, many of Morris & Co.'s later wallpapers were designed by J. H. Dearle and by other designers employed by the company, working in the style of William Morris (1834 to 1896). So a Morris-style leaf pattern is not automatically a Morris design. Check the attribution on any piece before you treat it as an original. The design history of Acanthus sets out what the record does establish.

Example room schemes

Three schemes follow the same logic: one dark, leafy focal piece, plain surroundings, one quiet secondary colour.

• Living room. Anchor the scheme with the Green Acanthus Cream Carnation William Morris print above a sofa, in a room with plain mid-tone walls. The V&A describes Acanthus as the first of the large-scale heavy patterns printed in darker colours, and the dark leaf weight in this print suits that approach, with the cream tones supplying the single secondary colour. Keep cushions and rugs plain.
• Bedroom. Use the Orange Acanthus Pomegranate William Morris print as a single large piece on the wall facing the bed, with plain linen in a muted tone drawn from the print. One focal piece, no competing pattern.
• Hallway. Hang the Design Drawing Teal Acanthus William Morris print at eye level on the return wall visible from the front door, with the surrounding wall plain. For more dense, dark schemes, see our guide to styling Peacock and Dragon.

In each scheme the pattern of scrolling acanthus leaves does the visual work, and everything else stays quiet.