Shades of the Countryside

Shades of the Countryside is now available to order as a wide width wallpaper. The artist’s original drawing, reproduced in England by master printers, has both magnificent detail and softness; its graphite tones and subtle, mauve blush are gentle on the eye.

The design, a beguiling panorama, celebrates Britain’s rural landscape and its intrinsic memory. In many parts of the countryside, the relationship between past and present is so intimate and strong that the present just seems to evaporate. ‘Shades’ captures this power and brings forth the ghosts of our rural past - the charcoal burner, the ‘one for the pot’ poacher, the mower, the wise-woman, the shepherdess, the hedgelayer, the diminutive ‘bird-starver’ and the ploughman. All are depicted as cameo-style silhouettes (ironically, the preserve of the wealthy or titled), overlaying their own realm within an expansive landscape of woods, copses, scrub, bog, fields and downland. Wild animals and stock pepper the view, along with beautifully rendered broadleaf trees, a medieval dovecote and an old shepherd’s hut, all casting lovely shadows. A breeze, used expertly by a hovering kestrel, ruffles ash, elm and oak. ‘Shades’ hints at both the multitudinous tones of the countryside and, more interestingly, at those traces of lives once lived in its nooks and corners.

This beautiful design was conceived and drawn by Cameron Short at Bonfield in rural West Dorset. The paper stock is non-woven, 147gsm.

‘Shades of the Countryside’ is printed to order and comes in two different scale versions: as a ‘2 over’ (4 cameos across its width) or a ‘3 over’ (6 slightly smaller cameos across its width).