Before. Way too much white! A handsome new look. The homeowners are going to paint the bottom area below the chair rail a softer white. They were waiting for the wallpaper to be in place before making a decision on a coordinating paint color . Looking toward dining room and family room . Coat closet and hall leading to bath s and bedroom s. I like to say that a texture like this is reminiscent of a man’s tweed suit . The material itself is an embossed vinyl , so has actual texture to it. It’s color is pretty consistant . This is a great alternative to real grasscloth – a product that presents many disappointing variations in color . Close up of texture and color . Note the bits of gold that reflect light . The homeowners hung a large mirror with a dark gold frame , which really set off against the wallpaper. (dumb me didn’t think to take a picture!) The wallpaper is by A Street Prints , under the Brewster umbrella. It’s a non-woven / paste the wall product , and was easy to install . Because NW contains 20% polyester , it is strong and durable . The vinyl surface is resistant to stains . It’s designed to strip off the wall easily and in one piece and with no damage to the walls when it’s time to redecorate . A very good alternative to real grasscloth or other natural materials . This purchased through Dorota at the Sherwin-Williams in the Rice Village. Wed – Sat , call first, please. (713) 529-6515 The homeowners made an appointment and then brought Dorota photos of their room, the floor , the mirror , along with their vision for the space. Dorota immediately went to the shelf and pulled out the selection book and opened it to this option. The couple loved it immediately! They did look at and consider other patterns and also ordered samples , but ultimately went with their first choice – this one. The home is in the Tanglewood / Galleria area of Houston . installer
Deep green wainscoting at the bottom, and on the right is a 100 year old ” dry sink ” with coordinating colored tile backsplash turned into a vanity, with period-appropriate faucet . Fresh and lively . But can you believe the design dates back about 100 years ? – same as the house! Close up. Looks like watercolor paint . Birds , butterflies , plants , flowers , and grasshoppers !C.F.A. Voysey is a male designer who worked around the turn of the last century, late 1800’s through about the 1920’s , and was part of the Arts & Crafts decorating movement . Most of his patterns are somewhat symmetrical , as well as whimsical and fanciful , with heavy emphasis on nature . This is a non-woven material , can be hung via the paste the wall method , although I prefer the paste the paper installation . It has a 20% polyester content and is thus more resistant to stains and humidity than traditional papers . And it’s designed to strip off the wall easily and in one piece with no damage to your walls when you redecorate . The brand name is Lord Twig and it comes from Finest Wallpaper , which is in Canada. This went in the rear powder room of a beautifully renovated 1926 4-plex apartment that has been artfully converted into a single family home , in the Woodland Heights area of Houston .
The wall has been skim-floated and sanded smooth , primed , and is ready for wallpaper .The homeowner did a great job coordinating the wall and ceiling paint with the colors in the wallpaper. This is a room that’s made for sleeping!At first I thought the pattern scale was too small for the large wall. But once I saw it on the wall, I really like the way it fills the space. To me, this pattern has a sort of calico look. Close-up shows the light texture on the paper. This is a non-woven material, so I’m installing via the paste the wall method . Here I’ve cut and arranged all my strips in the order in which they will be hung . This is a drop match pattern , which some folks think of as A and B strips. Meaning, for instance, an orange flower appears at the top of the wall on Strip A . But the next strip, Strip B, has a yellow flower at the top. When you get to the third strip, we are back to an A and an orange flower. Next comes another B strip – and so on. I’ve rolled the strips backward , with the top of the strip coming off first. This will prevent the printed face of the wallpaper from bumping into the pasted wall during installation . Wallpaper often shrinks a tad when the paste dries , and this can result in very minute gaps at the seams . With dark wallpapers , it’s pretty important to take steps to prevent white from showing at these gaps. Here I’ve measured out where each seam will fall, and taken diluted black paint to make a dark stripe under each seam . I don’t make the paint full-strength, because wallpaper paste isn’t formulated to adhere to paint. I want the wallpaper adhering to the primer I’ve applied. That’s also the reason why you don’t want to roll paint over the whole wall. Also, I have only striped some of the seam areas, and will wait until some strips are up on the wall before striping more lines. This is because wallpaper expands when it gets wet with paste, which can make it difficult to plot the exact width of each strip as you move across the wall. I use acrylic craft paint from the hobby store, applied with a bit of sponge. I keep a small dish of water to dip the sponge into, which dilutes the paint a bit. You also see a stick of chalk pastel . See next photo.Besides the wall peeking out from behind the wallpaper seams , it’s also possible / probable that the white edges of the wallpaper backing / substrate will show at the seams. I take a stick of chalk and run it along the edges, making sure to apply from the backside, to avoid getting chalk onto the surface of the wallpaper. Be sure to use chalk pastels and not oil pastels – oil will bleed and stain wallpaper. Some installers use liquid paint or markers – again, be sure to use water-based or acrylic , and never oil based or permanent markers . BN Walls is the brand. Altogether, this was a pretty nice product to work with. It was thin and very soft and flexible (many non-wovens are not).I wasn’t happy with all the seams, though. I believe the paper was cut with dull or wobbly wheels at the factory, because the edges seemed to not be perfectly straight . So I ended up with gaps and overlaps in some areas. Here you can see the wallpaper edges pouching up a bit due to excess paper. But, as I mentioned, this material was quite flexible, so it was pretty easy to spread these edges apart an use a tool to push them apart and then down to prevent them from pouching up again. Once the paste started to dry, these areas held nice and tight and flat. This is a townhome in the Rice Military neighborhood of central 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!
Potty room prepped and ready for wallpaper.Finished. This textured vinyl product had no pattern repeat or match. I used the reverse-hang method, which is where you hang one strip right side up, and the next strip upside down. That way the same edge is being placed next to itself – hard to explain. But the purpose is to reduce the chance of color variations at the seams. Here you see the true color and texture of the material. York is the manufacturer. I like just about everything they make.Just for fun, here is the coordinating paper that’s going in the adjoining master bathroom. Fine Wallpapers is also by York. Both these papers were purchased from Ballard Designs, their new brick-and-mortar store on W. Gray in Houston.
This pattern was used in the sink room.And this companion pattern went in the wet room – tub & toilet area.I love how the two wallpaper designs work together, and add more interest to the bathroom than using the same in both areas.
Can you say ’80’s?! Dated and soiled, it really was time for this 30+ year old original paper to go. Poor colors in this photo – the new paper is actually aqua and green a a bit of grey. One pattern was used for the walls, and another for the fir down / soffits. A little better view of the true colors.There is a pearlized or iridescent quality to this wallpaper. Candice Olson’s line by York. Anything she touches, you can bet it will have a bit of shimmer and glimmer and glam. Curlicues, caterpillars, or corn curls – this is a fun and active design, used just on the fir downs over the cabinets. The Easy-Walls line in the Chesapeake collection by Brewster is a very nice pre-pasted paper, easy to install and easy to remove. It’s a very thin non-woven material, similar to another of my favorites, the Sure-Strip by York. This shot, taken through the adjoining dining room, shows how beautifully the colors and patterns coordinate. Oh, and did I mention the beautiful new blue and green glass tile backsplash?!
The two-sister duo who selected patterns and colors for this League City (Houston) home did a superb job coordinating the two bedrooms, one bathroom, and the dining room and kitchen. The whole house has a very pulled together look, with a theme of gardens, light, fresh, and uplifting.
The first-time parents of this soon-to-be-here baby girl have done a super job of coordinating colors in the nursery. This wallpaper from Serena & Lily, the crib and changing table from Pottery Barn, a rug, and other accessories all share the same “toned-down” shade of pink.
The swirling leafy design of the wallpaper is a sort of background pattern (as opposed to making a huge statement on its own). It will suit any age child, from infant to school-girl to teen.
The home is in the Spring Branch neighborhood of Houston.
In the first photo, you are looking into a 2-room bathroom, through the sink room into the tub / potty room. The homeowner has chosen two coordinating wallpapers.
The floral went in the outer, sink room, because it had the largest mass of wall space, which would allow the large flower-and-basket pattern to play out.
The smaller, more chopped-up tub room was better suited to the smaller scale of the trellis pattern.
The patterns coordinate nicely, because they both incorporate the same colors, as well as share a classic design theme.
These papers are by Waverly, which is by York, and are in the Sure Strip line, which I like a lot. They were nice to work with, and will hold up nicely in these rooms.
These wallpaper patterns were 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.
These two rooms were featured in the March/April 2019 issue of Midwest Living.
The first wallpaper pattern is in an entry, and is by Schumacher, a well-established company. The bathroom pattern is by Jana Bek. She has some pretty interesting, coordinating lamps on her website. She sells linens, too – as you can see the curtains reflected in the vanity mirrors!
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