What’s Going On Here? – Thick, Stiff Paper

Digital Image

Here I am, about to end this wallpapered accent wall in a corner. Normally, you push the wallpaper against the wall and into the corner, position the straightedge, and trim.

But this paper is printed on the newish non-woven substrate, and this one is relatively thick and stiff. On the flat accent wall, it was nice enough to work with. But when it came to a corner, and then the double angle where the corner met the baseboard, the stiff paper did not want to cooperate. It was difficult to press the paper tightly into the corner, and I had to make several “relief cuts” in the bottom left corner, to ease the paper so I could get it to press tightly against both the corner of the wall and the baseboard.

It’s important to press the paper tightly against these angles before trimming, because if not, you could end up with a trim cut that is shy of the actual corner or baseboard.

Non-woven substrates are the new “darling” of the wallpaper manufacturing world. I very much like the thin, flexible non-wovens (like Sur-Strip). But these thick, stiff, and unyielding papers shouldn’t be put on walls, IMO, and could use a little research & development and reinvention at the manufacturer’s.

Tags: accent wall, flexible, non-woven, relief cuts, stiff, thick, thin, wallpaper