Falling Floral Mural in West U Dining Room

Two opposing accent walls , above the paneled wainscoting , will be papered in this dining room .

Here’s the south wall finished. Super cool how the flowers tumble from the sky downward .
This was actually two murals put together . Before you purchase , it’s important to make sure that one mural can be placed next to the other and have the pattern continue from one to the next .
Instead of starting in a corner and working across the wall , I plotted to put the fullest part of the mural in the center. This will nicely frame a buffet, or other furniture used on this wall.

Since this is a mural and each strip of wallpaper is different, and because I’m starting in the center with Strip #3, and then working left to right, and then going back to the center starting with Strip #2 and working from right to left, and because with a mural you have only one of each needed strip, so if you screw something up there is no more backup wallpaper to bail you out … So it’s important that you measure and plot and re-check everything before you cut anything and before you take any strip to the wall.
So here you see all my strips cut and positioned as they will be placed on the wall. This is a paste-the-wall non-woven material , and note that I have rolled each strip backwards with the top coming off first, and secured with an elastic hairband from the dollar store. This both gets rid of the ” memory ” of the paper wanting to stay tightly curled up , and also keeps the printed face of the wallpaper from bopping into the pasted wall .

Here’s the north wall, before.

Instead of centering the pattern on the full width of the wall, I centered it on the left section.

First strip going up butted against the vertical red line of my laser level .

Bosch brand , less than $100 at Lowe’s .

This wallpaper is called Artemis Climbing Walls and is in the Blackthorn collection .

Manufacturer is House of Hackney . This outfit makes some mighty nice wallpaper , and they have some very fun an innovative designs.
Most are sold as a 4-panel set mural , and can sometimes be tricky to measure for.
It’s a nice non-woven material , durable, and the seams are invisible . I used the paste the wall installation technique .
wallpaper installer houston

Adding Another Space – Yaay! … Another Homeowner Bitten by the Wallpar Bug

These homeowners were so thrilled with the two accent walls I did for them in their Montrose (Houston) townhome last week, that they had me come back today and use left overs to paper this art alcove.

Even though the project involved only two 5′ strips, it took me several hours … note the perfect symmetry and balance of the pattern, both side-to-side and top-to-bottom.

It all serves as a beautiful background for the art painting and silver service. And, since it’s the same pattern and color as used in two other areas of the house, it ties the various rooms in the home together.

This classic trellis pattern is by Thibaut Designs is well over a hundred years old.

Cole & Son Woods / Stars for a Baby Boy’s Nursery

See that top photo? This newborn baby was doomed to a boring, blaagh, unstimulating nursery. But Mom wanted more for her first-born son. Pastels and teddy bears wouldn’t do it. Mom found this innovative design in an un-baby-like color – and, boy, does it look great!

In the top photo, I am in the process of applying smoothing compound to a textured wall. Once dry, it will be sanded smooth and then primed, making it ready for wallpaper.

I hung this in a new home in the Bridgelands area of Cypress / Katy (Houston). The manufacturer is Cole & Son, a British company. It is a thick, fairly stiff non-woven material. It is intended to be installed with the paste-the-wall method, and it works nicely for single accent-wall projects like this.

But that thickness and stiffness means that it would be less suitable if it had to turn corners or meld into cuts around intricate moldings. That means it would be difficult to get to look great in rooms that have a lot of angles, edges to wrap, or detailed cuts. (bathrooms, kitchens, rooms with decorative moldings, etc.)

I don’t have a finished-room shot of this baby’s room, but, as you can see, the crib accent wall looks fantastic.

I like this matt-finish charcoal blue color much better than the more common black-on-white designs I have seen. And the gold stars really amp up the appeal.

From Pimply to Smooth

Digital Image

Digital Image

Today I prepped two accent walls, to be ready for wallpaper tomorrow. The first step was getting rid of this fairly heavy stipple texture.

To do that, I take a putty knife and knock off the highest bumps, then trowel on joint compound, which is something like plaster. Once it’s dry, I sand it smooth, vacuum up the dust, wipe dust off the wall with a damp sponge, and then apply a penetrating primer to seal it and prepare the wall to accept wallpaper.

The second photo shows how nice and smooth the wall is. And, not to toot my own horn, but I am much better at it than most painters or handymen, so no need to hire one of them to smooth the walls – I will most likely have to redo at least part of it anyway. 🙂

Why do the walls need to be smoothed? First of all, the bumps showing under the paper just look bad. Slipshod and uncaring. Second of all, if the wall is textured, then the wallpaper can only adhere to the tops of the bumps, which is not very secure at all. When the wall is nice and smooth, and properly primed, there is a sound surface for the paper to come in contact with and hold tightly.

Trends in Babies’ Rooms – All Over the Map!

I’ve done several accent walls in nurseries lately. An accent wall is an easy and affordable way to get major impact with wallpaper, without overpowering the room.

One family expecting a girl chose to go bold an dramatic, with a strong teal medalian design on a metalic silver background.
http://www.harlequin.uk.com/DesignDetails.aspx

Today I did another nursery for a little-girl-on-the-way, and the parents chose to go sweet and playful, with pastel colors, birds, butterflies, and flowers.
http://shop.ninacampbell.com/perroquet-wallpaper.html

Interestingly, both papers were British imports (Harlequin and Nina Campbell).

.

.

.

wallpaper installer houston