This bright and colourful wallpaper designed by Virgil Marti in 1994 caught our eye on a wallpaper research trip to the fabulous Whitworth Gallery in Manchester. As opposed to the other designers in the show Marti is not an interior designer, but rather an artist who occasionally uses wallpaper as his preferred medium. His use of psychedelic colours and the enlarged sleeping pill motif reflect the huge influx of mind bending drugs entering the 90’s drug market at the time of printing. The design itself is striking, well balanced and surprising but the real win is how Marti had applied hallucinogenic colours and his own social commentary to the often predictable world of interiors.

Following suit are the amusing wallpapers of British design company Timorous Beasties. They similarly discard accepted and polite interiors with their cheeky and provocative designs based on the ups and downs of London street life: www.timorousbeasties.com