1960s Korean Vintage Wallpaper — Sujin (original)

Sujin was discovered in an 1893 hanok in Boseong County, South Jeolla Province, and dates to the early 1960s. It is a ceiling paper. Its structure is a bold black-curve X-grid that flexes at each node into a four-leaf clover — a quatrefoil frame that reads at first glance like the top-down plan of a cast-iron railing or wrought-iron window grille. Inside each frame, silver-grey arabesques derived from the acanthus tradition curl in shallow relief. Black rosettes mark every crossing point; small diamond motifs punctuate the grid between them, evoking metal rivets and decorative studs. The pattern belongs to the lineage of the 19th-century European diaper — the clover-frame lattice with rosette and scroll that appeared simultaneously in British wallpaper and in cement and mosaic tile floors and ceilings. This vocabulary entered Korea through Japanese channels during the colonial period, when geometric ceiling papers became standard in Korean interiors. By the early 1960s, Korean manufacturers were no longer simply copying imported designs but recomposing the inherited grammar in their own terms: Sujin reduces the palette to black and grey two-color printing, and the Western quatrefoil subtly echoes the Korean juhwamun (柱花文) persimmon-calyx motif. The result, seen from below as a ceiling, creates the illusion of a hotel lobby or theatre interior finished in plaster moulding and decorative tile — achieved with nothing but paper and ink. GOSATE’s reproduction digitally restores the original pattern, printed on premium non-woven base paper manufactured in Sweden.   Roll size : 50cm by 10M Material : Non-woven paper Made in Sweden, Design in Korea