This is a 2-room powder room in the Memorial Villages area of west Houston. The home is new and openly spacious, but has many classic elements like very elegant moldings and trim work. I absolutely LOVE this 1890’s Victorian era marble sink with metal legs – a lucky eBay score. The homeowner has young kids and an active family and wanted to do something ” wild ” in the powder room. I’d say this Wonderland pattern fills the bill!The look is especially effective due to the homeowner’s bold choice to paint the woodwork this rich mustard ochre color. Looking from the sink room through the arched doorway into the potty room. Cute, cute pattern! And lovely material to work with. The glass flower light sconces are vintage, too, dating to the ’50’s or ’70’s. A similar-themed glass, floral, and brass chandelier will hang in the adjacent potty room. This is the mirror that will go up, almost touching each light sconce on either side. The grey tones in the mirror look super good with the grey marble vanity / commode sink. Manufacturer is Borastapeter distributed by Brewster , both fine companies. It’s a non-woven material and can be hung by the paste the wall method or by pasting the paper. The original wallpaper came from Finest Wallpaper in Canada, a good company. But the homeowner ordered half of what was needed, and was not able to get more in time for our install date. I suggested she call Dorota at the Sherwin-Williams on University in the Rice Village (713) 529-6515) and, sure enough, she found a source that had the paper in stock and could get it here lickety-split. This is the second time I’ve hung this paper in one week, and I’ve hung it several times previously and have it coming up again – always in this dramatic and colorful black version. People sure love the whimsy of frolicking frocked pigs!
No boring beige or all-white walls in this home of a growing and active family in the Cypress / Jersey Village area of Houston. Throughout the home, the mom has added touches of blue, green, yellow, and pink, along with a heavy dose of mid-century modern furnishings and accessories. Time to pull the powder room into the mix! Originally, this room was wallpapered in a typical ’80’s pattern, complete with a border running below the ceiling. Did I say ’80’s ?! That wallpaper had been removed, and the walls were painted a dark tan. The room was very boring and boxy and uninspiring.But … add a little wallpaper and – nothing boring here! And the look definitely invokes the ’50’s, ’60’s, and ’70’s – can you say Flower Power ? Spoonflower sells several types of wallpaper. Definitely do NOT get their peel & stick (see my page to the right), and I’m not fond of their vinyl material. I do like their pre-pasted smooth , which is what my client chose. Spoonflower doesn’t come in standard dimension rolls. It comes in 24″ wide ” rolls ” of 1′, 3′, 9′, or 12′ lengths. So measuring and calculating is a little more complicated than for traditional wallpapers. (The mermaid kitchen towel on the right is also by Spoonflower – and they have wallpaper to match!)Strips of this material are designed to be overlapped at the seams. This is good, because it prevents gapping at the seams as the paste dries, and it also eliminates stress on the wall that could cause underlying surfaces to delaminate and come apart. Do a Search here to learn more. The downside is that this overlapped area does leave a ridge running the length of the seam. Most people don’t mind the look, especially with a busy pattern like this one. Pattern # 4330883 is called Party Posies. This material is custom-printed. The homeowner ordered 11 rolls, and here you can see how the manufacturer has numbered each of the rolls in sequence (5th roll of 11 total).
The Meyerland neighborhood in Houston has flooded severely three times in five years, with 2017’s Harvey being the worst. Here is what people who want to stay in their neighborhood and their home are doing, to be safe from future floods. These are ’50’s & ’60’s era ranch-style homes.
They will add skirting around the bottom. All new construction, which tend to be larger 2-story homes, must be built up high. It’s major expensive to lift a house, so many of the ’60’s era homes have been patched up, but left on the ground. I’d say that at least 50% of the homes are still unoccupied, a year after the flood. Some have been raised, and some have been razed.
This couple scored a cool, mint-condition authentic Mid-Century Modern home in the Reliant Stadium / Medical Center area of Houston. They have some wonderful authentic period furnishings, and wanted to add a little “pop” as an accent, but not so much as to overwhelm the home. Well, you’ve gotta admit – this pattern really delivers!
This design is in the feel of the artist MC Escher, who bent minds back in in the Art Deco and Modern periods (’20’s-’50’s) with his “never ending stairways” type drawings. It’s by York, and is a non-woven material, and can be installed by either paste-the-wall or paste-the-paper (I prefer the paste-the-paper method). It is dimensionally-stable (doesn’t expand when it gets wet with paste), and is designed to strip off the wall easily when it’s time to redecorate.
It was bought from my favorite source for good quality, product knowledge, expert service, and competitive price – Dorota Hartwig at Southwestern Paint on Bissonnet near Kirby. (713) 520-6262 or dorotasouthwestern@hotmail.com. She is great at helping you find just the perfect paper! Discuss your project and make an appointment before heading over to see her.
The ceiling in this entryway was way off-level, so I knew that the motif I placed at the top of the wall would start going off-track as it moved across the wall. So I started in the middle of the wall, so that any pattern distortion would be visually lessened by being split across the width of the wall evenly from the center. In the second photo, I’m using my laser level to get a plumb starting point for my first strip.
The blue you see at the top of the second photo is plastic tape I use to keep paste off the ceiling. It can be used around woodwork and other surfaces, too. You can also see how the bottom section of the strip of paper is “booked” (folded back on itself). This shortens the strip of paper, thus making it easier to handle, and also keeps the pasted side from bumping against the wall, which could cause paste stains and also make the paper stick to the wall where I don’t want it to.
And, most important, with standard papers that need to absorb moisture from the paste, then expand and relax before hanging, booking helps keep the paper from drying out. Note: This is a non-woven material, so no waiting period is required, but I still booked the paper to make it easier to handle.)
In 2002, I hung this small blue floral print in the kitchen / breakfast area of a 1950 home in Riverside (Houston). The homeowner inherited the house from her grandmother, and she loves the vintage style and has kept her decorating pretty much true to the theme – including the floral wallpaper.
But a water leak changed all that. Damage was extensive enough that it made sense to remodel the entire kitchen. So new tile and granite came in. As much as the homeowner loved the blue flowery wallpaper, it didn’t go with the new grey-hued surfaces. So new wallpaper was called for.
As you can see in the third photo, the new pattern coordinates much better.
The homeowner has bought paint and wallpaper from Dorota at Southwestern Paint (see below) for many years, and she knew she could trust her to find the right paper. Sure enough – She told Dorota about the kitchen remodel and sent pics of the granite and tile, then made an appointment to visit in person. When she got to the store, Dorota walked over to her library of wallpaper books, chose one, opened it up, and pointed to this pattern. “This is what you need,” she said. And she was absolutely spot-on. The selection is perfect with the granite, the tile, the updated room, and even works beautifully with the older home.
This wallpaper pattern is by Wallquest, in their Ecochic collection, a series that I like a lot, and it was bought at below retail price from Dorota Hartwig at Southwestern Paint on Bissonnet near Kirby. (713) 520-6262 or dorotasouthwestern@hotmail.com. She is great at helping you find just the perfect paper! Discuss your project and make an appointment before heading over to see her.
This light-hearted pattern looks like line drawings of flowers. It went on an entry wall that faces you immediately when you enter the home. The homeowner bought her paper more than a year ago, and has had the three double rolls in their box, leaning up against the wall, ever since. Family coming for a summer visit was the incentive to finally get the paper up!
This cute pattern is from Waverly, an older, somewhat flowery brand that has been reincarnated (and updated) by York. It is in the SureStrip line, which is designed to strip off the wall easily when it’s time to redecorate. This brand performs beautifully, during installation and during the time it’s up on the wall, and I like it a lot.
This product is pre-pasted, which means that the manufacturer has put a dry paste on the back that is activated by running the strips through a water tray. See third photo. I augment that by spreading a thin layer of wallpaper paste on the wall and along the ceiling and baseboard lines.
The 50’s era home is in the Willow Meadows neighborhood of Houston. The homeowner is an artsy sort of person who is not afraid of color or avant garde decorating, so the flowery wall fit perfectly with her décor. She originally intended to cover the wall with family photos and other artwork – but once she saw the paper up and realized how much she loved it, she quickly became reticent to cover it up. 🙂
The wallpaper was bought at below retail price from Dorota Hartwig at Southwestern Paint on Bissonnet near Kirby. (713) 520-6262 or dorotasouthwestern@hotmail.com. She is great at helping you find just the perfect paper! Discuss your project and make an appointment before heading over to see her.
I you’ve read this blog for a while, you know that I LOVE vintage wallpaper. So I was thrilled when I saw that the December 2015 holiday double-issue of Southern Living magazine featured these beautiful patterns as backdrops for desserts in the holiday food spread.
These patterns range from the ’30’s – ’40’s – ’50’s. You can see the raised ink texture and the colors, still vivid decades later, and you can almost smell the soft scent of old paper.
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