Why Is Grasscloth Wallpaper So Expensive?

All you have to do is shop for grasscloth patterns for five minutes and you will likely notice that its prices per roll are 2-3x more than other styles.

And that is on the low end! Get up to the higher quality grasscloth options and you’re looking at minimum $350-$600+ per roll.

You can easily spend over $1,000 to do one medium-sized wall and another $1,000 to hire a professional installer to hang it.

Note: unless you are an experienced do-it-yourselfer we would caution about trying to go at this one alone. This paper is easy to mess up and you can ruin it by getting any adhesive on the front.

Which leads to the question: why is grasscloth so expensive compared to other wallpaper?

Keep in mind that we are talking about natural grasscloth wallpaper. It’s very important that you understand that grasscloth is split up between two sub-categories, natural and faux. They both look similar but are not the same.

Now back to why real 100% natural grasscloth is so much higher than other patterns. The quickest answer is that it’s very time-intensive to make (see image below 👇).

Regular wallpaper, no matter if it’s low end or high end, is produced in a factory. The quality and substrate of paper’s material, inks, and any special elements will determine where it falls on that spectrum. And obviously, if it has a popular name attached to the collection, it will command a higher price (i.e., Scott Living, Candice Olson, Stacy Garcia, Sarah Richardson, Joanna Gaines).

However, almost all the natural grasscloth found in the world is made by hand in Asia. And as you are probably ware, goods made by hand take longer and cannot be easily mass produced.

Grass blades, also called sisals, are weaved together into a pattern by an actual human. The process is faster than before but it still takes much longer to make one roll of grasscloth wallpaper than regular wallpaper.

What you get for that price is a distinct look and smell of grassiness in your home. You’ll never forget the smell of a room where real grasscloth is hung on the walls.

Faux grasscloth was specifically made for people who wanted the look of the real thing but don’t necessarily care about the smell nor want to be bothered with the extra care required at installation. It’s also much less expensive because it can be made like any other regular wallpaper in the factory.