Backgrounds & Patterns

Vintage books often have wonderful endpapers with fanciful and decorative designs printed on them. Most repeat and with careful editing could easily be pieced together to make page-sized background papers. Since endpapers are rarely signed or attributed to a particular artist, I am only including end paper backgrounds that were used in books published over 120 years ago to ensure that the pattern images presented here are all in the public domain.

In this section of Reusable Art, you will also find a few vintage advertising images scanned from magazines. Unfortunately, the ones we have so far would not really work for scrapbooking as they are too small. But, I think they would work great on websites and other electronic projects.

golden marbled background

Golden Marbled Background

Vintage cover paper from an old seed catalog. Lovely public domain golden marbled background for your digital and printed art projects.

black and gold endpaper background

Black and Gold Endpaper Background

Vintage black and gold endpaper and background image from the 1890s. Delicate flowers and leaves are repeated on a black linen paper.

green leaf endpaper design

Green Leaf Endpaper

A pretty, repeating background image. A page-sized green leaf endpaper image from 1907.

vintage green floral endpaper

Vintage Green Floral Endpaper

No matter what sort of paper crafting you do, there’s always a need for patterned paper. This vintage green floral endpaper is well-aged and delicate.

Beige, Red & Black Background

Marbled, vintage beige, red and black background image. Originally used as endpaper for a botany book, I think it would make a great wallpaper or frame image.

Purple Marble Wallpaper

Vintage purple marble wallpaper pattern. Dark, dramatic and bold from a vintage botany book’s cover.

Scenic Endpaper

Lovely scenic endpaper that would make a wonderful background image for another project. It is the work of Thomas Fogarty (1873 – 1938), an American artist.

Floral Endpaper

1887, vintage floral endpaper design and background paper. Would work great for websites, scrapbook pages and anywhere you might need a floral background.

Wildflowers Pattern

Vintage endpaper design from a book of poetry. This wildflowers pattern is in the public domain and could be left plain or easily colorized.

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