Winter Wheat and Turkey Red
Turkey Red print and Winter Wheat wallpaper.
When I was working on our wallpaper, Winter Wheat, a friend admired an early proof and suggested that I consider creating relief prints which people could frame and hang on their walls. In other words, art for art’s sake. I took her advice! Here's the story of how our Winter Wheat wallpaper and our Turkey Red print came to be:
Inspiration, blocks and proofs for Winter Wheat and Turkey Red.
I found inspiration in Turkey Red wheat, a type of heritage grain. This class of grains is distinguished by seeds that pre-date modern agro-industrial breeding and hybridization practices. I first learned about these special grains when I listened to an interview with Ellen King, the renowned baker and author of the recently released cookbook, Heritage Baking. King discussed how heritage grains typically have high nutritional value and low gluten-content as well as inherent pest resistance and suitability for regenerative agriculture. In short, according to King, heritage grains can improve both our diet and our food production system.
Turkey Red wheat. Photo by Ben Penner.
Listening to King made me want to learn more about heritage grains, and that's how I came across Turkey Red wheat. Brought to the US by Mennonite immigrants from Crimea in the late nineteenth century, Turkey Red is a typical heritage grain: healthy and robust. With its golden stalks and gem-like kernels, Turkey Red is also beautiful. Ben Penner, a Minnesota farmer who raises certified organic grains, kindly sent me photos of his Turkey Red crops, swaying fields that are truly amber waves of grain.
L: Bouquet of Flowers in a Crystal Vase by Nicolas Van Veerendael, 1662. Metropolitan Museum (public domain). R: Charcoal sketch for Winter Wheat.
Turkey Red further enchanted me when I learned that the wheat is often grown with other plants such as common vetch, red clover, soybeans and field peas, companion crops that improve soil health, slow erosion, repel pests, control weeds and invite pollinators such as Monarch, Zebra Longtail and Karcher butterflies. To capture this complex and vibrant ecosystem in visual terms, I found inspiration in Dutch floral still lives- small, lively worlds unto themselves- and began to sketch.
Two blocks are used to create a print with two colors.
Once I had completed drawing the motifs and resolving the pattern repeat, I transferred my sketches onto blocks: one block for light-colored motifs and one for dark. Next I carved the blocks and printed them. In the image above, the block on the left is printed first with light ink. The block on the right is printed next with dark ink. Registration must be perfect in order for the shapes to line up. The finished print is on the right.
Next I sent the prints, along with an image of my initial sketch in repeat, to my wallpaper manufacturer in Connecticut where they were digitally printed as wallpaper on Forest Stewardship Council-certified clay coated paper. At this stage, the design received its final name. As Turkey Red wheat is planted in the autumn and known as a winter wheat variety, I named the pattern Winter Wheat. To order a sample of Winter Wheat wallpaper, please contact us directly or reach out to one of our showrooms.
Turkey Red, color Ochre, relief print, 2022.
Our print Turkey Red is the cousin of our Winter Wheat wallpaper. The inspiration is the same, but the blocks are different. Whereas Winter Wheat is a two color design and is based on two blocks, Turkey Red is a single color print based on one block.
Winter Wheat and Turkey Red: art for the walls!