Including right here on the cover! And a real coup! … A magazine that’s pretty much dedicated to the all-white or all-grey trend in decorating, as well as minimalism … it’s so exciting to see some pattern and color in the ” farmhouse ” themed homes. Let’s take a look …Textured grasscloth behind bookshelves in a living room .Two-tone classic toile on one wall as a background to a stairwell . It warms up the space, without hitting you in the face. Soft , cloud – like feel behind this credenza . Look carefully right above the baskets , and you’ll see an overlapped seam. Some commercial murals are hung like this, as well as the very popular patterns by Spoonflower , which is a budget-friendly and DIY – able , good quality material and brand . (But ONLY their ” prepasted smooth ” option. Do NOT get the ” traditional pebble ” nor their ” peel and stick . “More of the toile pattern , in the entry , with batten board wainscoting and a chair rail , in a mud room . Also called rear back door entry . : )Floral pattern in the laundry room . I’m getting lots of queries for wallpaper in laundries … must be trending right now!Soft two-tone floral in small bathroom .Textured grasscloth behind desk in home office .Apologies for the sideways image … WordPress used to be easy to use, and I could correct this. But they “upgraded” their program and made many, many features much more difficult to work with. I tried tutorials on how to fix this, but after reading and watching tons of info and videos, I gave up. It used to be just one click ! Anyway, note the cheery breakfast room. Colorful without being overwhelming . Closer picture. Very innovative use of floral pattern with subdued color around the archway / entry to another breakfast nook . Note that the back of the nook also wears a textured wallpaper . Sorry for the out-of-order picture … another frustration from the “upgraded” WordPress Editor . This gives an idea of what the afore-mentioned breakfast area looked like pre-wallpaper. The magazine didn’t mention a brand, but this sure looks like one of Serena & Lily ‘s designs . Of course, when one company makes a popular pattern , many other companies make their own versions . These days, usually you see pattern on the accent wall behind the headboard . So it’s a little unusual to see wallpaper on all four walls of this master bedroom . But it works, because the pattern is simple and the colors are kept to only two , so the overall feel is calming , rather than busy . Fooled me! I thought this headboard accent wall was done in tile – but it’s wallpaper !The same paper on a kitchen cabinet .
Breakfast area beforeBreakfast area after … with my work table set-up still in the middle of the room.Kitchen sink / window area before.FinishedThis fruit-and-floral motif is a very retro look, which was popular in the 1950’s – early 1970’s . The background looks like linoleum tiles – very period-appropriate.Close-up.Exclusive Wallcoverings saw the current interest in retro / vintage looks, and designed this very appropriate pattern. This was a thin and very flexible non-woven material , and was a delight to work with. As are all non-wovens, this is designed to strip off the wall easily and in one piece when it’s time to redecorate. To install , you can paste the paper or paste the wall . This home is in the Lexington Woods area of Spring , ( north Houston ).
Sink / window area, primed and ready for wallpaper. Pattern nicely centered on this wall and at ceiling line.Breakfast area window wall before.I tweaked the pattern just a tad so I could get the dark vertical line along the cabinets on the right, and then also down the left side where this wall meets the painted wall. It makes a nice stopping point for the eye, and it looks so much better than box motifs that might have been chopped in half.The “star” design adds so much energy and life to this room!The pattern is in the Sure Strip line of pre-pasted wallpapers by York Wallcoverings. I really like Sure Strip. Graham & Brown makes a very similar design called Indigo, which is very popular. I like this one better, for lotsa reasons. The home is in Pearland, a southern suburb of Houston. Some previous posts show other rooms I did at that same time. The homeowners did a wonderful job of coordinating the colors and themes throughout the home, working with golds and greys. The wallpaper and design help came from Ballard Designs new physical store on W. Gray in Montrose / River Oaks. After I arrived to start work, the homeowner decided she wanted the paper behind the refrigerator and also over a bank of cabinets to the right over the ovens. I hadn’t measured for these areas, so we didn’t have enough paper. Ballard could order more, but it would take several weeks to arrive. So I had the homeowner contact my favorite resource, Dorota Hartwig at Sherwin-Williams on University in the Rice Village. (713) 529-6515. She’s been slingin’ paper for decades, and knew right where to go that could supply the same paper in just a few days. The additional two bolts arrived yesterday, so I was able to hang them and finish the job today, right on schedule. 🙂 This home suffered extensive water damage to the entire first floor due to burst pipes after the major freeze here in Houston in February 2021. It’s taken these folks more than a year to get their home back together. I was proud to help them get their home and lives back to normal – and a good bit prettier!
Breakfast nook before. The blue is a pretty color. But … … the wallpaper is so much brighter and lighter. The homeowners will have the banquette painted (still deciding on what color) and a cushion made for the seat (still deciding on color and pattern). The rest of the home has a strong mid-century modern feel, so this mod pattern and colorway fit right in. The gold is slightly metallic. The brand is Designer Wallpapers. It’s a traditional wallpaper material, and I like this brand a lot. The home is in the far north east Heights area of Houston.
Tomorrow this breakfast area wall will get wallpaper. Today is prep day.The wall has a very heavy texture, plus some issues with previous patches in areas, probably due to drywall cracks. I need to skim-float over all this to smooth the surface. In addition, the current paint is quite glossy – and this can present a problem for the smoothing compound to adhere to it properly. So I want to prime over this gloss paint before I skim-coat the walls. The primer has to both stick to the gloss paint and provide a base that the smoothing compound will adhere to. Another issue is that I won’t be using this every day, so keeping it shaken up and useable was a consideration. I looked high and low for an appropriate primer. Finally I snapped that the Roman Ultra Prime Pro 977 that I use under my wallpaper jobs checks off all the boxes … It sticks to just about anything, and it dries nice and flat / matt so any topcoat (wallpaper or smoothing compound) can grab ahold and stick, I have it in my van all the time, and I use it frequently enough that it’s always mixed up and ready to use. To top it all off, it dries in less than an hour. Voilà ! This stuff can be tricky to find. Sherwin-Williams used to stock it for me, but became unreliable. Now Murphy Brothers on Bissonnet (Houston) gets it just for me. Besides dropcloths on the floor, here I’ve tacked strips of thin paper dropcloth material along the wainscoting (I also do this along baseboards) to keep any drops or roller splatters from marring the homeowners’ floor and moldings.Here it is applied. Since my goal is to cover and eliminate the glossy paint, and then provide a base for the smoothing compound, this coat doesn’t need to be opaque or cover the wall evenly. Tomorrow we’ll see how the wallpaper turns out!Fast-forward … I’ve floated the wall and sanded it smooth. Compare the smoothness to the “before” picture at the top.
Cheery but not overwhelmingly bright, this “Parada” wallpaper pattern lightens this breakfast room while still keeping the feel warm and inviting.
I think the motifs look like those gummy “orange slices” candy with the sugar crystal sprinkles. 🙂
The manufacturer is Thibaut. While I usually love their products, this one was difficult to work with. It is a screen print, and is printed on a thick, stiff backing that sucked up all the paste before I could get strips to the wall. I experimented with several pasting techniques, and found that lightly sponging the back with water before pasting, and then booking the paper (folding pasted side to pasted side) and then placing in a plastic trash bag for few minutes, helped to both soften the material and prevent the paste from drying out.
I also rolled on a light coat of paste under where the seams would fall. This held the seams tighter to the wall. The material was still stiff and somewhat difficult to work into corners or trim around the detailed moldings.
The home is in the Heights neighborhood of Houston, and the interior designer is Stacie Cokinos of Cokinos Design.
Sego palm fronds is what this pattern reminds me of. Serena & Lily call it “Fallbrook” or “Cut Leaf,” depending on where you’re looking. No mind – it’s a fresh, crisp look with a lot of movement and fun.
I hung this in the powder room near the rear entrance and breakfast area of the home of a young family in the Energy Corridor area of west Houston.
Usually Serena & Lily prints on paper, and I am a great fan of that product. But this is the first time I’ve encountered a non-woven material from that company. I can’t say that I loved this stuff. It was quite stiff, and very translucent.
Lots of manufacturers are starting to print on non-woven. There are many benefits of that material – but it has to be a good non-woven. If S&L is moving in this direction, I hope they will do some research and networking and come up with a better substrate to print on.
Serena & Lily’s wallpaper designs are bright and cheery – just the thing to wake up the breakfast nook for this family with young toddlers in the Energy Corridor area of Houston.
S&L’s papers are nice to work with – among my favorites. You order directly from them, on-line.
Apologies for the dark photos. It’s the best my elementary phone camera can do. But look closely at the second photo, and you can see the pattern wrapping around the windows.
Here’s another home where all the walls were originally white. You can see how a little pattern and color add personality, definition, and warmth.
This swirly wallpaper pattern was chosen in a soft hue, so when you look at the breakfast nook from a distance, it feels snug and warm, but still light enough to fit into the home’s crisp white vernacular.
The space looks small and simple, yet took me at least six hours. There was a lot of intricacy involved in getting around the windows, and keeping the pattern intact.
Serena & Lily is one of my favorite brands. One of their catalogs came in the mail recently, and maybe that is why – I’ve had a rash of clients these days using this brand.
The home is in the Bellaire neighborhood of Houston.
People often don’t realize that you can’t use every square foot of paper that the label claims to include. Much paper is lost to ‘waste.’
Today, I hung a 14-single roll breakfast room with three large windows.
This is a picture of all the wallpaper that was cut off and thrown into the trash, in order to match the pattern, turn corners, and etc.
The large roll on the floor, and the one behind it, are both rolled tightly and are larger than they appear in the photo. LOTS of paper that ends up being unusable.
Always consult the paperhanger for accurate measurements, before ordering your paper.
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