The homeowner bought this townhouse in central Houston 12 years ago and has always wanted to get rid of this really blah, ditsy small print in the commode room of her master bathroom . I know the design trend for the last several years has been white , grey , grayeige , minimalist , serene , clean , sparse ,,,, but there is nothing in this gal’s home that is remotely any of that … Her home is all about color , pattern , meaningful items prominently displayed – and lots of them! (Example: notice the fancy doorknob and the tassle hanging from it.) I really enjoyed working here, because that’s pretty much my decorating style , too.So here’s continuing that ” moody maximalism ” theme into the potty room. Note the cabinet and ceiling have been painted a coordinating color . Opposite corner . The room is REALLY tiny , and the door opens inward , so it was quite a bit of a challenge squeezing myself, my tools, and my ladder all in there. Close-up. The pattern is called Artemesia Absinthium , and is by Klaus Haapaniemi & Co in Finland . I don’t know who this Klaus guy is, and have never worked with his wallpaper before, but he must be half-high on psychedelics ,,, I would highly recommend a visit to his website and checking out the various fabric and wallpaper options . If you’re into maximalism and bold drama , that is! The material was a quite nice non-woven , and was easy to work with . I did stripe dark paint under where the seams would fall, in case of slight gaps showing the wall beneath . I was a little disappointed that there was some slight paneling / shading / difference in depth of color between some of the strips – but not too noticeable . Non-woven papers are designed to strip off the wall quickly and easily and with no / minimal damage to the wall when you redecorate . I do find it interesting that this pattern is so very similar in design and name to the very popular Artemis by House of Hackney , another good wallpaper manufacturer . Like I say, for every company making a cool pattern, there are others making their own versions / knock-offs .
Always cool to see wallpaper featured in a decorating magazine, to nudge homeowners toward using paper in their own homes. This dark jungle pattern is a dramatic transition from entry to living room. No boring all-white walls here! Bold color and a pattern full of visual movement make this powder room a fun and energizing space. As I like to say – you can get away with a lot of drama in a small space like a powder room!
One-of-a-kind would describe this powder room in the West University neighborhood of Houston. You walk down two stairs to get into the room, marble tile covers the bottom portion of the walls, the ceiling is low, the ceiling slopes, and there is a curved wall on the left, as well as a 5″ high space under the sink – what I call a torture chamber for wallpaper hangers.
The homeowner contemplated grasscloth (not a good choice in a “wet” room, and especially for a family with young children – read my Grasscloth page on the right). She really liked Schumacher’s “Feather Bloom” pattern on grass. But when I made my initial consultation visit, I advised that the 36″ high and 36″ wide scale of the pattern was too large for her small, chopped up powder room. And grasscloth is prone to color variations between panels. On top of that, the Schumacher is insanely expensive.
Thibaut to the rescue! Their “Aster” design is an obvious riff on “Feather Bloom.” But it’s a smaller scale, so suits this room much better. It’s on stringcloth, a man-made material, so no worries about shading or color discrepancies. There is a light protective coating, so a bit more resistant to stains. And the string gives the product the textured look and feel that people are loving these days (see close up photo). Best of all, the Thibaut version is way more affordable!
The homeowner has a small, round, gold mirror with a fluted edge that will look fabulous placed in the “bull’s eye” of the aster flower over the sink.
The once bland all-grey room now has color, texture, movement, and a whole lot of drama!
As I like to say, you can get away with a lot of drama in a powder room. Here is proof!
The new home is in the Garden Oaks neighborhood of Houston. The wallpaper is by Marimekko. It is a non-woven material, and can be hung by the paste-the-wall method or, the method I prefer, paste-the-paper.
This wallpaper 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.
So you thought Versace was all about clothing and shoes … Well, that name is all over wallpaper, too!
The owner of this brand-new home in the Garden Oaks neighborhood of Houston loves to entertain, and he wanted something in his powder room that would really rock the socks off his guests. As I like to say, you can get away with a lot of drama in a powder room – and he pulled it off!
This is a textured gold-and-black vinyl bonded to a non-woven backing. The material appears to have stitching (see close-up) – but that is just a design embossed into the thick vinyl.
What there IS that the homeowner was not expecting (bought from images viewed on-line, without seeing an actual sample) is a good bit of glitter.
There is just enough glimmer to reflect light and catch your eye, but not so much as to be overdone or gauche.
This is one of those jobs that you have to see in person to fully appreciated, because the photos show only a fraction of the coolness of this material.
The homeowner of this brand-new home in the Garden Oaks neighborhood of Houston loves to entertain, and he has a large personality. He turned his living room into a bar / lounge / reception sort of area. It’s the first thing you see as you enter the house.
This room has a lot more luxe and drama and cool furnishings that I am not showing, out of respect for my client’s privacy. But suffice it to say, the overall effect will really WOW everyone who walks into the home.
One photo shows this material rolled out on the floor, to see how the pattern plays out across the width. Turns out the dark striped ridges come nine to a set. The edges on either side of the goods have more than nine ridges … This means that when strips are placed next to one another, you will end up with many more than nine ridges at each seam. So some has to be trimmed off of either side of the wallpaper, to ensure that each band of stripes has only nine ridges.
Lots of higher-end papers need to have their selvedge edge trimmed off. But this is the first time I’ve encountered a thick, textured paper that had to be hand-trimmed. Note the photo showing this process.
My goal was to leave four ridges on the right side of the paper, and then five ridges plus a flat line on the opposite side of the paper, to maintain the correct rhythm of ridge-to-flat spacing. The paper was dark, and the lighting was poor, so it was difficult to see where to trim.
Also, the thickness of the ridges held my 6′ metal straightedge off the material, so it was very important to hold my razor blade absolutely straight, to avoid a beveled or wavering cut.
It helped that the contractor had painted the wall black (per my specs), so, after I deglosssed and then applied my clear primer Gardz, there were no worries about background color peeking out at the seams. As extra assurance, I colored the edges of the paper (which was bonded to a white substrate) with dark chalk.
The product was very thick and stiff. It was difficult to trim through and took many swipes of my razor knife. A simple accent wall like this is one thing … but this material would have been a real pain to hang in a room that had intricate decorative moldings, or in a complicated room like a bathroom – I would probably have had the homeowner remove the sink and toilet and then replace them after the wallpaper was up. ($$ to pay the plumber!)
As it was, this single accent wall behind a well-loved entertaining area was the perfect spot for it.
The homeowner is overjoyed with the finished bar. In fact, he can’t wait to host his first party!
The top photo is a look from a 1972 issue; these days, both geometrics and metallics / Mylars are popular. The second photo is also a throwback to late Mid Century Modern – terrazzo, like so many ’50’s and ’70’s homes had on their floor, but this look-alike is wallpaper. Third photo shows wallpaper framed in panels and hung on either side of an entry to a dining room.
You might have to look closely to see the pattern in the last photo, because it’s soft and faint. Everyone (including me) calls this “the blowfish,” but it’s really called “Aquario” and is by Cole & Son. I’ve hung it a number of times, in several colors, mostly on a more dramatic dark background, in small powder rooms, where you can get away with a lot of drama. This pale colorway is much easier to live with when the pattern is on all the walls of a large room.
The homeowners of this newish home in the Bellaire / Braes Heights / Willow Meadows area of Houston like it’s serene, monochromatic look. But they wanted something with more color and eye appeal on this focal wall in the dining room.
They chose this tone-on-tone 4-panel mural by Phillip Jeffries, screened on silk on a paper backing. The soft and whimsical design is called “Wish” – remember when you were a kid and blew the fluffy seed pods off of dandelion stems?!
A mural is pleasing to the eye, in part because it is one scene, and doesn’t have the repeating design motifs that a typical wallpaper pattern has.
I particularly like the way the design mimics the look of the chandelier. These are little things that visually pull the room together. And the homeowner did it without hiring a decorator!
The silk material was bonded to a thin paper backing. The first day, I primed the wall and then hung a liner , a special paper that will cushion the silk wallpaper and provide extra “grab” to hold the seams in place. I let that dry overnight, and hung the mural the second day.
The mural comes in a set of four panels. Each panel came 36″ wide, but there was a selvedge edge that had to be trimmed off by hand with a straightedge and razor blade, reducing the width of each to 33″.
This wall’s width required 21″ of a fifth panel. The mural is printed so that the left side of Panel 1 matches up with the right side of Panel 4. So the homeowners simply needed an additional Panel 1 (which became the fifth panel, last on the right), to cover their wall.
The mural was 11′ high, but this home’s wall was only 9′. So I rolled all the strips out on the floor and plotted out which were the most important design elements to keep, and which we could afford to lose. I cut off about 16″ from the top, and another 8″ or so from the bottom.
Silk is a natural material, and so there are color variations between panels, and even within the same panel. I hate these color variations in grasscloth, but in this silk material, I think they enhance the look. It looks like there are real strips of silk fabric laid on the wall – and that’s exactly what there is! In the close-up shot, you can even see nubs of the silk fibers here and there.
This wallpaper pattern is by Phillip Jeffries, and 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.
What a fun paper! I have a koi pond, so that makes me doubly crazy about this pattern!
I hung this lively pattern in a large powder room in a home in the Memorial area of Houston that had been flooded by Hurricane Harvey. It’s four months after the storm, and this is the first person whom I have seen who has had repairs finished and who has been able to move back into her home. (See the darker drywall at the bottom of the wall, in the top photo? That’s the new Greenrock that replaced the drywall that got damaged by water.)
The rest of the house is very traditional, with a lot of antiques. So going with bright color and a fanciful fish pattern was a bit of a leap. But you can get away with a lot of drama in a powder room, because you don’t spend a lot of time in there. And the homeowner was ready for something uplifting.
This pattern is by York, in their SureStrip line. I love both the manufacturer and this line of papers. It is a thin and pliable non-woven material, turns corners nicely, and will hug the wall tightly. It is nice to work with, and does not shrink when it dries, so no gaps at the seams. It is designed to strip off the wall easily and in one piece when it’s time to redecorate.
It takes chutzpah to choose a wallpaper pattern like this! But, boy, did it bring this powder room from blah and brown to bold and energizing and full of color!
The pattern looks like agate stone, and at 27″ wide by 24″ long, is large scale. I thought that the pattern, color, and size would overwhelm this small, under-the-stairs powder room. But the homeowner went ahead and bought her first love – and, I have to admit, it turned out GREAT.
The room is a lot brighter now, and the squiggly curves of the design add a lot of life to the room. When they talk about their powder rooms, a lot of people use the term “jewel box.” This room would definitely qualify!
You can get away with a lot of drama in a powder room, because you don’t spend a lot of time in there. And if you don’t want to look at it 24/7, you can always simply close the door.
I hung this in a fairly new home in the Rice Military neighborhood of Houston. The paper is good quality, but not expensive, and was very nice to work with. This wallpaper pattern is by York, 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.
The Wallpaper Lady's Blog 