Protecting the Ends of Wallpaper Rolls

Cardboard end caps are a nice touch to try to prevent the edges of the wallpaper from being damaged during shipping.

‘Iconic’ Woods Pattern by Cole & Son on Heights Entryway Accent Wall

Before. Getting ready to prime. Note that I have protected both the floor and the baseboards with dropcloths.

Done! Dramatic!

Detail.

This bolt had been damaged in shipping, and the right edge had dings / dents. With this thick, puffy non-woven material, these could show at the seams when butted against the next strip. So I plotted the placement of my strips so this one would be on the far right end. That last strip was not the full width wide, so 8″ of the right side got cut off where it met the adjoining wall. That eliminated the worry of those dented edges showing.

I used the paste-the-wall method to hang this non-woven wallpaper. With the wall wet with paste, it would be easy to get paste all over the wallpaper if you used the traditional installation booking technique. So I’ve learned to roll the material up with the print side in, and then secure with a hairband (from the dollar store). Then you can easily carry the rolled-up strip up your ladder, remove the elastic tie, and then let the paper fall into place. Only the back side comes into contact with the paste on the wall. Once you get good at this technique, you will never have to wipe paste off a seam, nor off the woodwork or adjoining walls.

Cole & Son says that this “Woods” pattern has roots dating back to 1959. I guess that makes it truly iconic. I can say that it is quite popular – I’ve hung it a bunch of times.

Repairing Damage from Remodeling

I hung this paper in a little boy’s bedroom about two years ago. Now a new baby is coming, so Son #1 is moving from the nursery to his “Big Boy’s Room” next door. In the process of the shuffle, the parents had the connecting Hollywood bathroom updated, and this involved moving a door – which meant messing up the wallpaper.

As you can see in the top photo, instead of taking the time and effort to remove the wallpaper, the workmen put their patching compound right on top of it. I don’t like hanging paper on top of paper, for many reasons. There are adhesion issues. And also, for one thing, it’s not good to have seams fall on top of seams. For another, because the new paper is somewhat thick, you would have a visible ridge from top to bottom along the edge of the new strip.

So I took a razor knife and cut roughly around the workmens’ patch. Then I stripped off the paper around it, up to the edge of the adjoining strip. I did this on both sides of the corner.

This wallpaper is of a non-woven material, and is designed to strip off the wall easily and in one piece when it’s time to redecorate. I was pretty disappointed that that turned out to not be the case.

On the other hand, I was happy that it didn’t. Stripping paper that way puts a lot of stress on the wall surface, and you can end up with delamination (coming apart) of various layers under the paper (primer, skim-float, paint, drywall).

So I used a more labor-intensive, but lower-impact method. Click my page to the right for more info on the process. I first stripped off the top, inked layer of paper. That left the white backing still adhering to the wall. I used a sponge to apply plenty of water to this backing. The idea is to reactivate the paste that is holding it to the wall. Once that paste was wet enough, the backing pulled off the all cleanly and easily.

I was really pleased that my primer from the original install held up perfectly under all this soaking and tugging. I had worried that it might “rewet” and pull away from the wall, which had been my experience with it before. I had used Gardz, a penetrating product designed to seal torn drywall. It’s also good at sealing new skim-coated walls. And wallpaper sticks to it nicely, so all the better!

One photo shows you the stripped off area next to the edge of the remaining strip. You can see the thickness of this existing strip. The new wallpaper will butt up against this, and there will be no ridge because the thicknesses of both strips are the same.

Another photo shows my stripped-off area next to the contractor’s patched area. There is a difference in height between the newly revealed wall and the patched area – and that will show as a ridge or bump under the new wallpaper.

To eliminate that difference in height, I skim-floated over the area. In one photo, you can see the wet (grey) smoothing compound. I set up a strong floor fan to assist in drying. My heat gun also came in handy.

Once it was dry, I sanded it smooth. Now you don’t see any transition between the newly exposed wall and slightly higher patched area. I applied Gardz to the all the newly patched areas. Set up the fan again. And once it was dry, I put up the replacement paper.

It’s a good thing the family had paper left over from the original install. If they had had to purchase new paper, it could have come from a new Run (slight difference in color shade), and that would have meant stripping off and replacing three walls.

We had barely enough paper. The corner was out of plumb by as much as 1/2″ from floor to wainscoting, on each side of the corner. That adds up to an inch out of whack. That one inch meant we needed a whole new strip of wallpaper, to get the paper on the wall to the left to match up with that on the wall to the right.

Long story short, the whole thing turned out great. There is a bit of a mis-match in that corner, but it’s not very noticeable at all.

The wallpaper is by the Scandinavian company Boras Tapeter.

The home is in the West University neighborhood of Houston.

What Does A Plumbing Repair Have To Do With Wallpaper?

Thursday, I hung grasscloth on three walls of this master bedroom, and left for the night. When I arrived on Friday to finish the last wall, the homeowner hustled me into the adjoining bathroom and showed me where a repair had been done to the toilet’s water intake line the previous night.

By freak accident, some decorative item had fallen off the toilet tank and hit the water intake pipe “just so.” The pipe was of plastic, and had a few weaknesses in it. So when it was struck in just the right (or wrong!) place, it broke – and spewed water everywhere!

Luckily, the homeowner was home and caught this immediately. And, luckily, there is a neighborhood “guy” in the Heights (Inner Loop neighborhood of Houston) who is able and willing to come out at any hour to fix things like this.

Fixing it has to do with accessing the plumbing pipes. And that has to do with cutting into the wall.

Eeeek!

The homeowner was freaking out, that the plumber might have to access the pipe from the other side of the wall – the wall that I had just hung her beautiful new $$ grasscloth wallpaper on!

A cut through the drywall here would have necessitated replacing the entire strip of wallpaper. And because of how grasscloth is trimmed to fit specific dimensions, and because of the color differences between bolts and strips, it would have looked better to have replaced all the strips on the wall.

Major hassle, major work involved, and it would have used up all our “extra” paper.

Luckily, the plumber was able to fix the pipe by cutting through from the bathroom side.

The homeowner still has to get someone to come repair the drywall and paint. But VERY lucky that no other repairs had to be done.

And SO lucky that the homeowner was on-site, and knew to cut off the water to the house. If the leak had run for an hour – not to mention overnight or over a weekend – much more would have been damaged… Not just my new wallpaper, but the hardwood floors, moldings, insulation, possibly drywall and possibly furniture, and more.

Farrow & Ball, Damaged Paper

While I’m griping about F&B, I’m including a photo of an 18″ long portion of one bolt that was severely damaged by the factory (another bolt had similar damage). This particular pattern was a sort of mural, with no repeating pattern that I could cut off and replace with more of the same pattern. In other words, I needed that 18″!

I ended up plotting the layout of the room so that this damaged left edge of the strip would end up cut off by the right side of a door frame.

Unwrapped Bolt – What’s Wrong With This Picture?

This is how the homeowner’s wallpaper arrived – no label, no wrapper, and with two fingerprints marring the first two feet of paper (upper edge, in both rectangles).

This is one of the problems with buying wallpaper off the Internet. This came from a site that sells clothing, jewelry, shoes, and – oh yeah … home accessories, too.

The price may be very cheap.

But you have no idea what you are getting. For instance, this company’s website give virtually no information, other than the dimensions of the bolt, the color, and that it’s printed with water-based ink on “quality wallpaper.” I guess that to an unschooled homeowner, that sounds good. But to a paperhanger, that provided virtually no useable information.

But what’s worse is that many of these outlet type websites are buying up and reselling discontinued, damaged, or returned goods from other sources. That’s why this paper has no wrapper or label. There is no way to know the run number of the bolts she has – so they may well be slightly different shades, which will be unacceptable on her wall.

These companies don’t have a salesperson who is knowledgeable about wallpaper. They have an order-taker, and a guy in the warehouse who runs and grabs some rolls off the shelf, paying no attention to run numbers or condition of the rolls.

I’ve hung this paper before, and know that it’s made by an established manufacturer (as opposed to a “boutique” company with some paper and a digital printer and dubious quality). Even though it would cost a bit more, it would be much preferable to buy wallpaper from the manufacturer itself, or, better, from a local retail store (not a box store) specializing in and knowledgeable about wallpaper.

You’ll have someone who can help you with accurate measurements, the various types of substrates, run numbers, double and single rolls, availability (discontinued patterns), shipping times, and who can easily straighten out any problems if they should occur.

For my recommendations on where to buy wallpaper, see the page at right “Where to Buy Wallpaper In Houston.”

Skulls, Brains, or Leopards?

From a distance, do you see skulls? The homeowner’s daughter says this pattern looks like brains. But move closer, and you will see the real design motif – leopards! They are cleverly intertwined into a trellis pattern. I love the fool-the-eye effect!

I hung this in a powder room in a home in Bellaire (Houston) that was damaged by flooding from Hurricane Harvey. (I hung the original paper when the family bought the home in 1992.) The family has moved back into their home, and using something quirky and fun in the powder room has added a lot of personality to the newly finished space.

This wallpaper pattern is by Thibaut Designs, and 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.

Color Difference Due To Fading Over The Years

I hung this original paper more than 15 years ago. Some areas had become stained, so I was called to fix it. Luckily, the homeowner had saved the left over paper, so there was enough to replace the damaged strips.

You can see a slight difference in color between the strip on the left, which was hung 15 years ago and has been exposed to light all that time, and the strip on the right, which has been stored in a dark closet until I put it up today.

Soring Birds Day Dream in a Baby’s Nursery

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What a well-loved pattern for babies’ rooms! This soon-to-be-with-us baby in a Spring Branch (Houston) home has a lovely new nursery. I have hung this many times, but this is the first time in this colorway.

The pattern is called “Day Dream” and is by Hygge & West, an on-line company. It comes in many colors, and fits into many rooms or themes.

The second photo shows me about to hang the first strip, having plotted the layout so the bird will fall down the center of the wall, and using my laser level (the red line on the wall) to keep the paper plumb.

Hygge & West papers can be challenging to hang. The seams curl and the paper waffles. The second-to-last photo shows the slight curling at the seams where ink falls on the seams, which is common to their paper. However, this time, I had much less difficulty with the paper in general….It laid flat without waffling or wrinkling, and there was very little curling at the seams. I hope that this means that the H & W team has listened to us out here in the field, and has started to use a better substrate and ink formula.

Still, they could use some help in packaging their merchandise for shipping – the final photo shows damaged ends of rolls of paper, due to being banged about during shipping. Unfortunately, all of the rolls were banged up, and the damage went deep into each bolt – meaning that I couldn’t cut around and discard the damaged areas. Since this pattern has a lot of open space, there isn’t much pattern to disguise these bashed areas, so they are going to show on the wall.

Beautifully Packaged Wallpaper

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One of my big rants is about wallpaper that has banged up edges, due to being bashed about during shipping. “All the manufacturer has to do is add a little bubble wrap,” I say. Some companies use thin cardboard “collars” around the ends of the bolts – but these end up being too tight and crimping the wallpaper, which creates dents and scars.

Well, this manufacturer went a mile beyond, and came up with a way to keep the bolts of paper free from any shipping damage.

Each roll of wallpaper is encased in a plastic sleeve. At either end of each roll is a “puck” made of corrugated cardboard (not visible in the photo), custom-cut to fit the diameter of the bolt, and with a tab in the center that pokes into the center of the bolt of rolled up wallpaper, ensuring that it stays in place. All inside that plastic sleeve.

Then each of those bundles is placed inside a custom-tailored-to-fit box made of cushioned corrugated cardboard; one double roll of wallpaper to a box.

Then all of those boxes were placed inside a large shipping box, also made of cushy corrugated cardboard.

This is by far the best thought-out and most-effective protective wrapping I have ever seen. Every single bolt of wallpaper arrived in perfect condition.

The product line is A-Street Prints, and the manufacturer is Brewster.