Baroque is delicately formatted and creates a sense of mystery or intrigue in the way it appears to fade in and out, almost as if receding into a shadow. This pattern is from Frank Tjepkema’s first wallcovering collection for Wolf-Gordon called Tjep. Cubism. Based on the cube format Baroque contains stylized foliage that intermingles with this cube structure, the foliage hanging on the underlying structure much as ivy clings to a trellis. Where there are voids in the structure there are breaks in the foliage, which creates a strong verticality in the pattern. The design is printed on a Mylar ground, so while the pattern is printed in tone on tone reminiscent of damask, the strong geometry of the cube is highlighted by the reflective nature of the Mylar. This design illustrates the more subtle use of Mylar today, whereas wallcoverings of the late 1960s played up the mirror-like reflective qualities of the material.
Tjepkema is a multi-disciplinary Dutch designer working in architecture, product design, and installation design. He creates designs for furniture and jewelry, and interiors for retail and restaurant establishments, as well as lounges at Schiphol Airport in Amsterdam. He studied at the Design Academy Eindhoven, Netherlands, and the Sandberg Instituut in Amsterdam. He founded his design studio Tjep. in 2001. Many of his designs contain a strong underlying geometry visible either in the underlying structure or the surface materials. A similar aesthetic carries over into this wallcovering collection.