The V&A says William Morris produced over 50 wallpapers in his career, and the first one he designed was Trellis, in 1862, a pattern suggested by the rose trellis in the garden of Red House, his home in Kent. The museum adds that he set out to design his own because he could not find any that he liked well enough to use at home. I love that. A whole body of work began with one fussy man and his walls.

 

That fussiness is how I like to shop wallpaper: by type first, print second. There are three kinds here, peel-and-stick, grasscloth and textured, and designer prints, and each one answers a different question about your wall. Everything is sold by the roll or the panel, so I read the coverage on each listing and plan my own wall before I fall for anything.

 

Peel-and-stick is the low-commitment way in, and the first eight are all that. The Blossom Chinoiserie in cream, with flowering branches, lemons and blue birds, is the one I would put behind a bed. The Canopy Toile in dusty blue-gray and the Azulejo Tile Floral, blue birds on cream tiles, both come as tall panels, so they suit a powder room or a short hallway. The Jeremiah Brent Fallow Dusk is a painterly green landscape with a cottage and a winding stream, and the black Zellige looks like handmade tile with pale grout lines. For quieter walls, the Lily Pad, the Old World Trees in soft grayscale and the ecru and brown Charles Street Stripe do the job. My tip: stick a short strip in a corner for a day before you commit the whole wall.

Run your palm over a wall before you choose a color, because grasscloth is mostly about what your hand tells you. These are all woven or fiber-look papers, and the texture does half the decorating for you.

 

The plain ones are the easiest place to begin. The Rifle Paper Co. Palette is a solid moss green with fine horizontal fibers, the Bataan Wheat has honey-colored streaks, and the Tomur Beige is cream with slubby fibers and dark flecks. The Beale in cream is a clean woven texture, and the Magnolia Home Plain Grass Sisal in deep navy is the moodiest of the lot. I would put that one in a study with brass lamps and not much else.

 

If you want a pattern, the Sarah Sherman Samuel Winona has sketch-like blue line florals over a tan woven ground, and the Kirby is a chocolate brown and cream stripe-and-dot motif. The Tessier is a printed faux version with an oatmeal woven-fiber look, which is a simpler idea for anyone who likes the look but not the fuss.

 

Before you order, ask for a sample and tape it up in daylight and lamplight. Seams can show on natural fibers, and that is part of the charm, so decide if you like it first.

 

What I would skip: a dark sisal in a room with one small window.

Pattern scale is the first thing I check on a designer paper, because a print that looks calm on a screen can take over a small room. Hold the sample against the wall you actually have and step back across the room.

 

The Morris & Co. trio makes a good study. The Oxford Union is a symmetrical Arts and Crafts floral with coral-red blooms and green leaves on cream. The Myrtle is a dove-gray tone-on-tone woodland floral adapted from a William Morris embroidery design, which makes it the easy one for a bedroom. The Pimpernel Floral has coral-pink blooms on a dense green leafy ground. The first two are paste-the-wall and pre-trimmed, which makes hanging them more forgiving.

 

House of Hackney began in 2011, dreamed up in a London townhouse by Frieda Gormley and Javvy M Royle, and the Hollyhocks bouquet in reds, oranges and pinks on green is the loud one. It comes as a panel set, which is a different kind of math than a roll.

 

The MINDTHEGAP Two Storks is embroidery-style storks and paisley scrolls on blush. The Scalamandre Linnea by Sandberg, in misty blue and cream, and the Fig Garden, a muted green with fig, grape and pea vine, are the leafier pair. The Schumacher Pandora in peacock, with teal and chartreuse ferns on white, is the fresh one.

I would begin with the wall, not the roll. Decide whether you want something you can peel off, something your hand will notice, or something with a name behind it, and that decides the section you shop.

 

Then I would order a sample of my top two, tape them up and look at them over a week. Check the repeat, the seams and the light at dusk.

 

Morris could not find a wall he liked, so he made one. I would hold myself to the same standard and keep looking until one makes me smile when I flip the switch.