Find articles
Room & Space Planning

Wallpaper for a narrow hallway: work with the walls between the doors

Fredrik Hallengren
Fredrik Hallengren, Writer Guide ยท 4 min read ยท Updated Oct 2026

In a narrow hallway, doors and storage often leave only short stretches of wall on show. A repeating pattern can work around these interruptions, while a landscape mural needs a clear wall where you can enjoy the scene as you come in.

Lots of doors? Choose a pattern that works around them

If you want to wallpaper around several doorways, we recommend a repeating pattern. Flowers, leaves or geometric shapes appear in several places, so there is still something to see on the narrow sections of wall.

Floral Gaze, Laurel has a floral pattern with foliage that repeats across the wall. Pay particular attention to the size of the flowers. In a narrow hallway, you walk close to the wallpaper and notice details you might miss in the product image.

You can order a wallpaper sample, a small printed piece of wallpaper, to see the colours at home before choosing. For Floral Gaze, it also shows the pattern at its actual size. Hold it against the wall between two doors and take a step back. This gives you a better idea of how much of the pattern will fit there.

Give a landscape an uninterrupted wall

Historic Lands, Forest Green is one of our most ordered forest designs. The trees and the opening between them suit a wall you can see as you come in through the front door.

We would choose a clear wall for this design. That could be the end wall directly opposite the front door, or a long wall with the storage elsewhere. There, the landscape can show without a mirror or coat covering the part that caught your eye.

Enter the wall's width and height in the preview on the product page. You will see what fits when the image is adjusted to your hallway wall. Move the design and compare a few positions. Look particularly at the opening between the trees and how much of it you want to keep.

In a narrow hallway, doors and storage often leave only short stretches of wall on show. A repeating pattern can work around these interruptions, while a landscape mural needs a clear wall where you can enjoy the scene as you come in.

Start with the view from the front door

Stand where you enter. Which wall do you see first? It is often a good starting point for a feature wall, even if another wall is larger.

Look from the adjoining rooms too. If the living room door usually stays open, you will also see the hallway pattern from there. A feature wall lets you give the design a more defined spot and control how much of it is visible through the doorway.

Do this with the coats on their hooks and the bags where you normally leave them. You will see how much wall you actually have to work with.

A light background matters more than a few light details

In a hallway without windows, the hall light determines how you see the wallpaper's colours. Look at the sample where the wallpaper will hang, with your everyday lighting on. If light comes in from an adjoining room, compare it with the door both open and closed.

For a lighter look, start with the background of the design. Pale flowers on a dark background still leave plenty of dark colour on the wall. A light background with fewer dark details gives a different overall effect. Compare the balance of colours in the full product image and use the sample to judge the shades at home.

Plan the wallpaper and storage together

A clear wall opposite the coat hooks may give the design more room than the wall behind the coats. If you need to wallpaper beside the storage, a repeating pattern works well even when parts of it are hidden.

Our wallpapers can be wiped with a damp cloth. Follow our care advice if you need to treat a stain.

Take a photo from the entrance before you decide. It can make it easier to see whether you want a pattern on several walls or a landscape on the clear wall.