The best places to buy wallpaper are Home Depot and Lowe’s when you want to see texture in person, Amazon and Walmart.com for inexpensive peel-and-stick, and brand sites such as Graham & Brown, York Wallcoverings, and Hygge & West for full collections and samples. This guide covers the physical covering sold in rolls and panels for interior walls, not the digital background image on a phone or desktop. Which store fits you depends less on price than on one decision: permanent or removable.
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Permanent or Removable: Pick the Type Before the Store
Wallpaper is a decorative surface covering made from paper, vinyl, non-woven fiber, or natural material such as grasscloth, hung to add pattern and texture that a coat of latex cannot. The format is centuries old. Tapestry and woven textile hangings were costly, so less wealthy households in Renaissance Europe turned to printed paper instead. Albrecht Durer’s Triumphal Arch, an old master print completed in 1515 from 192 sheets for Emperor Maximilian I, was made to hang in palaces and town halls. By the mid-18th century Britain was the leading maker in Europe and exported in bulk, as the documented history of the medium shows.
Today choosing wallpaper comes down to how the adhesive works. Paste-the-wall puts glue on the surface and hangs dry paper over it, which is friendliest for a first-timer because nothing stretches while it soaks. Prepasted has dry adhesive on the back that you activate with water. Peel-and-stick uses a pressure-sensitive backing and comes off again, which is why renters default to it.
| Type | Best for | Surface it needs | Removal |
|---|---|---|---|
| Paste-the-wall (non-woven) | Whole rooms, first-timers | Smooth, primed | Strips off dry in sheets |
| Prepasted | Budget full-room jobs | Smooth, primed | Soak and scrape |
| Peel-and-stick | Renters, accent areas | Smooth, not textured | Peels off |
| Grasscloth and silk | Studies, dining rooms | Very flat; installer advised | Professional job |
| Mural panels | One focal area | Measured to size | Depends on backing |
Wallpaper material matters as much as application. Non-woven backing is the modern standard and strips off dry years later. Vinyl handles kitchens and bathrooms. Grasscloth, silk, and flock give real texture but show seams and stain easily, which is why installers charge more to install them.
Read the washability label too. Labels run from washable to scrubbable to strippable, and only scrubbable belongs behind a stove, a sink, or in a busy office. For a nursery, look for water-based inks and GREENGUARD Gold certification, which limits chemical emissions indoors.
How Much to Order, and How to Read the Label
Calculate by square footage plus repeat waste, never by a rough count of rolls. Two numbers on the label drive the math: coverage and the pattern repeat.
Coverage. American wallpaper rolls are traditionally 27 inches wide by 27 feet long, and retailers such as DecoratorsBest use about 56 square feet per double roll as a rule of thumb. A European roll covers about 5.2 square metres, which is roughly the same 56 square feet in a narrower, longer bolt. Never compare products by price per roll alone; a cheap narrow roll can cost more per square foot than a wide one.
Repeat and match. The repeat is the vertical distance before a motif starts over. Straight match lines up edge to edge; drop match staggers each strip by half a repeat. A large drop repeat can waste a big share of every roll, and that is what blows the budget on large-scale wallpaper designs.
Work out quantity step by step:
- Measure the width and height of every area, then multiply for square footage.
- Subtract each door and window so you are not paying to cover openings.
- Add 5 to 15 percent for trim waste, and more on a large drop match.
- Divide by the coverage printed on the label, about 56 square feet for an American double roll.
- Add one spare roll to the same purchase so every roll carries the same batch number.
Where to Buy Wallpaper In Store
A store visit pays off when texture or color matters more than selection. A raised motif or metallic ink under warm light is where a lot of online picks fall apart, and shelves carry only a fraction of each chain’s catalog.
Home Depot and Lowe’s
Home Depot’s wallpaper catalog filters by brands including RoomMates, Brewster, NuWallpaper, Norwall, and Fine Decor, with traditional, prepasted, and peel-and-stick rolls. Lowe’s sells the Scott Living peel-and-stick line from HGTV’s Drew and Jonathan Scott, part of a partnership with the retailer that began in 2017, and has carried Laura Ashley designs produced by Graham & Brown. Both chains keep far more online than in the decorating aisle, so check store stock before driving over.
Target and Walmart
Target sells its own Project 62 peel-and-stick designs plus Tempaper, which ran a Target-exclusive back-to-school collection from June 14 to September 19, 2026. Walmart’s wallpaper range runs budget-first: Better Homes & Gardens peel-and-stick (its Gwen Stripe pattern draws hundreds of reviews), RoomMates, and vinyl rolls from Brewster and York. Most of that range ships from the website rather than sitting on the shelf.
Independent Decorating Shops
Independent decorating shops often keep wallcovering books you can flip through and carry trade-grade lines the big chains never stock. They will request swatches for you and usually know local installers by name, which matters for grasscloth or silk. If you are coordinating with trim color, see our guides to Sherwin-Williams paint and Behr paint.
Where to Buy Wallpaper Online
Online is where the real selection lives, and three routes cover almost every project in the USA: big marketplaces, brand sites, and custom mural specialists.
Amazon, Walmart.com, and Wayfair
Amazon carries the widest peel-and-stick wallpaper range, including Tempaper, RoomMates, NuWallpaper, and thousands of unbranded rolls. Wayfair and Walmart.com add pasted vinyl and non-woven goods from many brands. The marketplace catch is listing quality: favor pages that state thickness, repeat size, and match type, and skip any that leave all three out.
Direct From the Brand
York Wallcoverings, incorporated in 1895 and still printing in York, Pennsylvania, describes itself as the oldest wallpaper manufacturer in the United States. It sells direct, as do Graham & Brown, Chasing Paper, Hygge & West, and Tempaper. Going direct is right for custom sizing, full mural sets, and the complete archive, since retailers carry only a subset of any collection. Anthropologie also sells a small, design-led selection.
Wallpaper Direct USA, Spoonflower, and Mural Sites
Spoonflower prints to order from designs by independent artists around the world, or from an image you upload, in peel-and-stick and pre-pasted versions. Wallpaper Direct USA imports British and European brands and sends a few free swatches before it starts charging. For photographic murals, Rebel Walls and Photowall size panels to your wall’s measurements. Made-to-measure murals are usually non-returnable, so measure twice.
Five Brands Worth Ordering From
These five wallpaper brands were chosen on catalog depth, backing quality, and removal behavior, the attributes behind most buyer complaints. Prices change often, so check the current listing.
Best overall: Graham & Brown. Founded in 1946 in Blackburn, Lancashire, by Harold Graham and Henry Brown, still family-run, and marking its 80th year in 2026. The archive holds more than 50,000 designs, from contemporary geometrics to elegant damasks. The company exports to more than 70 countries, and its paste-the-wall papers are forgiving for a first-timer. Check price on Amazon
Best peel-and-stick: Chasing Paper. Launched in 2013 by Elizabeth Rees, who comes from a Milwaukee printing family, with removable wallpaper panels in 2-by-4-foot sizes that align by repeat. It lifts clean off smooth primed drywall. Shop the brand direct
Best budget: generic peel-and-stick rolls. Quality varies by seller, so favor listings that state thickness in mils and name the match type. Fine for a feature area or a closet, risky for a whole dining room. See the range on Amazon
Best luxury: Hygge & West. Founded in 2008 by Aimee Lagos and Christiana Coop, with papers hand screen printed on American-made stock by a Chicago-based printer. Collaborations with independent illustrators and with Heath Ceramics give it a look closer to art than decor. Browse the collection
Best for rentals: Tempaper. Founded by twin sisters Jennifer Matthews and Julia Biancella Au, with removable panels and designer collaborations including Genevieve Gorder, the Novogratz, Bobby Berk, and Cynthia Rowley. Sold direct and at Target and Amazon. Check price on Amazon
Mistakes That Ruin a Wallpaper Job
The costliest wallpaper mistake is ordering short and topping up later. Batch numbers, called dye lots, drift between production runs, and the second delivery rarely matches the first in daylight.
- Splitting an order across two purchases. A visible shift in shade halfway across a room cannot be fixed without redoing all of it.
- Putting peel-and-stick on textured drywall. Orange peel and knockdown finishes trap air under the adhesive and edges lift. Spoonflower and Brewster’s NuWallpaper both say their removable papers need smooth surfaces. Skim-coat first, or switch to a pasted product.
- Trusting the on-screen color. Monitor calibration, paper stock, and gloss level all shift the result. Get a sample and live with it for two days.
- Buying unlabeled marketplace rolls for a whole room. Listings with no thickness spec, no repeat measurement, and no match type often mean thin stock that tears at the seam.
- Picking a drop match to save money. A cheap straight-match pattern is far more forgiving than a bargain drop-match one, and it wastes less.
Start by measuring the room and pulling the repeat figure off the listing, then get one sample of your top two candidates before you commit to a full quantity of wallpaper. If the drywall is textured, budget for skim-coating or choose a pasted product instead. Renters should default to removable panels. Pairing the finished look with new curtains or wood flooring is easier once the design is settled, and Architectural Digest and Wallpaper* magazine (which covers design, interiors, architecture, and fashion) are useful for inspiration.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can peel-and-stick go on textured drywall?
No, not reliably. Pressure-sensitive backing needs a smooth, clean, primed substrate to bond. Orange peel and knockdown finishes leave air gaps that turn into lifted edges. Skim-coat first, or hang a pasted product over lining paper.
What is the difference between a single roll and a double roll?
American rolls are often priced by the single but packaged as a double, roughly 56 square feet of coverage as a rule of thumb. European bolts are sold as one continuous length of about 5.2 square metres. Compare cost per square foot rather than per roll.
Can you paint over old paper instead of stripping it?
You can, but only over tight, well-adhered wallpaper, and only with an oil-based or shellac primer first. A water-based primer soaks through and loosens the adhesive underneath. Seams and embossing stay visible afterward, so treat it as a stopgap.
Are samples free, and how many should you get?
Some sellers, including Wallpaper Direct USA, send a few free; most retailers charge a small fee each. Get three at most. Tape them up and check in morning light, afternoon light, and lamp light, because gloss stock changes character far more than a flat swatch does.
Reviewed by the wheretobuyguides.com editorial team. Retailer and brand details checked October 2026.