Wallpaper Paste Residue = Crackled Paint on Bathroom Cabinet

Adding to my previous post, here is the wooden door to the medicine cabinet, which took on a lot of paste when the previous installer hung wallpaper. He evidently was unable to successfully wipe off all the paste.
The unfortunate aftermath is that the paste will eat into paint that is existing, or that is applied later, and cause it to crackle and flake.

Wallpaper Paste Residue = Crackled Ceiling Paint

You’re looking at the junction between a wallpaper border at the top of a wall and the ceiling. You can see crackled and flaking paint on the ceiling.

This was almost surely caused by the previous wallpaper installer getting paste on the ceiling (which is typical and normal) but failing to wipe it off completely.

The paste is clear and difficult to see. Even when you do a diligent job, it’s easy to leave some residue behind.

The problem is that wallpaper paste attacks water-based paint, and will cause it to do what you see above … crackle, flake, chip off. This can happen if the paint was in place before the wallpaper paste got on it, or if there was paste residue and fresh paint was applied on top of it.

In fact, the decorative paint finish called “crackle finish” is accomplished by applying hide glue onto a surface and then coating it with latex paint.

The crackly paint on the ceiling is unattractive, and impedes adhesion. It takes a lot of scraping and sealing and skimming the wall to rectify this.

A way to avoid this is to astutely wipe off all paste residue. Better yet, what I do is to use special plastic tape at the top of my wallpaper strips, so that no paste gets onto the ceiling in the first place. Do a Search here to see previous posts describing that technique.

You can also use a stain blocker like KILZ Original oil-based primer, or BIN shellac-based primer, to seal off the area before painting. There are water-borne primers that claim to seal such problem areas – but I prefer to stick with oil or shellac.

Danger Tape Brings Safety

Read below for info.

After pasting the wallpaper, I apply the plastic strip to the pasted side of the top, then book the paper, making sure to not let the tape contact any of the wet pasted areas.

The red stripe you see is plastic “Danger” tape from the home improvement store. You can also use yellow “Caution” tape. Some installers use painter’s plastic cut into strips … although I find it too flimsy. I put this on the back / pasted side of my wallpaper strips to keep paste off the ceiling, woodwork, etc. And, as you see to the left of the top photo, when you bring a strip of wallpaper up against another strip, such as in your final corner, the plastic tape will prevent paste from transferring onto or staining the other strip of wallpaper.

After I make my trim cuts, I remove the excess wallpaper and the plastic tape – making sure to get the parts on both sides of my cut.

Now the paste can reach the wall surface, and adhere the wallpaper securely, with no paste residue left on the ceiling, molding, or wallpaper.

Crumbly / Unstable Wall Issues

Starting to strip wallpaper. You see the top, inked layer, the tan backing layer, and the white skim-floated wall beneath.

Wall surfaces delaminating at seams

Gardz, a penetrating sealer that binds surfaces together and dries hard.

My first idea was to just Gardz the lifted areas. The sealer is newly applied and still wet in this photo.

Gardz’ing the whole wall created a more stable surface. This doesn’t look much different from the photo above. But in actuality, the the Gardz has sealed and “locked down” the surface, as well as soaked into the material and sealed the inner layers as well.

Applying a skim-coat to even out the surface levels.

Once this skim-coat is dry, it will be sanded smooth.

The installer of the original paper did a good job of skim-floating the wall and creating a smooth surface. But he didn’t apply a sealer or primer. Thus, when I used water to strip off the old wallpaper, the moisture soaked into his skim-coat (drywall joint compound, a plaster-like substance, which we also refer to as “mud”). Some of the skim-coat came away from the wall,,, particularly in areas of stress, such as where the wallpaper seams had lain.

In fact, long (years) before I began stripping the wallpaper, many of the seams had started to pull away from the wall, taking inner layers of the wall along with them. This is because wallpaper shrinks as it dries, and that creates tension on the wall. If the wall surface is unstable, these layers can delaminate (come apart), and the result is an open seam with chunks of wall material stuck to it.

This can also happen over time, as temperature and humidity changes can cause the wallpaper and / or wall surface to absorb and then let go of moisture. All this puts stress on those wallpaper seams and on the layers inside the wall.

Besides these seam areas that let go, I had one wall where the entire surface came apart in a mottled effect.

Another factor is that the original skim-coat had been applied over a glossy paint. It’s hard for anything to stick to gloss. The guy probably should have rolled on a “bonding primer” before applying his skim-coat.

Of course, all that increases the time and materials needed, and ups the cost to the homeowner.

Gardz is a wonderful product that is designed to soak into surfaces and “bind them together.” It dries hard and is pretty water-resistant. It was originally intended to “lock down” torn drywall. But workmen quickly discovered that it would fix a whole lot of other surfaces – such as my delaminating skim-coated walls.

At first I thought I would just Gardz (we use it as a noun and as a verb!) the areas that were lifting. Once it dried, I intended to skim-float over these areas, sand smooth, and then prime the entire room with my usual wallpaper primer – Roman Pro 977 Ultra Prime.

But I realized that, even after I wiped down the walls with a damp sponge, they were still covered with powder or grit. This was powder from the layer of skim-coat, as well as residue from wallpaper paste. Neither my primer not wallpaper will stick securely to powder.

So I decided to roll Gardz on to all the walls, ceiling to floor.

Fifth photo – I was really pleased with the way the Gardz soaked in and drew all those layers together. There was no more power on the surface, and the inner layers of the walls were all pulled together.

To even over these vacant areas, and to create a pristine new surface, I skim-floated over the entire wall surface – all walls, floor to ceiling. See last photo.

Once that is dry, tomorrow morning, I will sand everything smooth. Next I’ll apply my 977 primer.

Then walls will be stable, and the surface will be ready to take on the new wallpaper.

Whoops! Someone Painted Over Old Wallpaper

Just looking at the walls, I had not noticed . But when I removed the light switch cover, it was clear that someone didn’t bother to remove the old wallpaper, and just painted over it.

Actually, they probably did do some prep, because you could not see seams under the paint. They must have taken steps to cover the seams.

And there was no flashing … difference in texture between paint over wallpaper, for instance, and paint over smoothing compound that was used to disguise those seams.

And there were no bubbles (caused by latex paint on top of wallpaper that absorbs moisture from the paint and swells) and only a few tiny loose areas.

Still, it would have been better if the previous guy had put some effort into removing the wallpaper, and then washing the paste off the wall and then sealing with a stain blocker, to prevent paste residue from causing the new paint to crackle and flake off the wall. Then the room would be adequately ready for paint.

Paint Must Be De-Glossed Before Adding A New Coat On Top

The original paint in both these photos was a gloss or semi-gloss. When it came time to update, someone applied a coat of new paint right on top. Then the floor guys came and stained the floor. To protect the new paint, they applied painter’s tape. Unfortunately, when the tape was removed, it took some of the new paint along with it.

Believe it or not, even something as relatively gentle as wiping wallpaper paste off the woodwork is enough to cause poorly-adhered paint to delaminate.

This happens because the new coat of paint was not given a sound surface to grab ahold of and adhere to.

To have properly prepared the original gloss paint to accept the new coat of white paint, the painter should have done one or more of the below:

1.) Sanded the paint to knock off the gloss. This leaves dust residue, so that dust will need to be wiped off with a damp rag or sponge (rinsed clean frequently) or a Tack Cloth.

2.) Wiped down with liquid chemical deglosser, such as Liquid Sandpaper.

3.) Primed with a bonding primer, formulated to stick to glossy surfaces, and also formulated to serve as an appropriate base for the new paint.

A primer is also not a bad idea to follow up in the case of 1.) and 2.) above.

Yes, all of this is a whole lot of work, and it creates dust and/or odors, takes more time, and adds cost.

But it’s a step well worth the investment, because properly prepped and painted surfaces will hold up and look professional for decades to come.

10″ Head Space – I Can Do It!

Not only was there only a mere 10″ of clearance between the cabinet and the ceiling, the niche was way deeper than the typical cabinet, because below it was a 36″ deep refrigerator. Even standing on the very top of my ladder (ya know – the step that OSHA says NOT to stand on!), and contorting my whole torso on top of the cabinet, it was difficult to reach the back wall. And even more difficult to maneuver my hands and tools.

I managed to skim-float the area, sand it smooth, and prime it. Today it was time to get paper onto it.

The fewer tasks I had to do, the easier (and safer) it would be to accomplish.

The first thing I did was to trim the paper horizontally at the point where I wanted it to meet the ceiling. This eliminated the need for me to squeeze in a straightedge and trimming blade and try to manipulate them in the deep, narrow space.

Likewise, I wanted to avoid having to trim in the last corner (on the right). So I measured carefully, and pre-trimmed my last piece to fit. It was 3 7/8″ at the top, but widened to 4″ at the bottom.

After the strip got pasted and booked, it expanded a tad, so I had to trim off a teeny bit from the right edge. And also a little more off the upper right, due to the wall being un-straight at that point.

I was able to get my plastic smoother and damp microfiber cloth into the space, to smooth the strips to the wall and wipe off any paste residue.

I Hate Sloppy Work! – Overspray on Light Fixture

This home in Kingwood (far northeast Houston) was flooded during Hurricane Harvey in 2017. The homeowners were pleased with their contractor’s work in getting the repairs made and getting them back into their home.

But when you get close and look at details, you can see that everything was not done as carefully as it should have been.

I guess the painters did not bother to remove, or even cover, the light sconces in this powder room. Because when they sprayed paint on the woodwork, plenty of paint got splattered onto the new fixtures. Look at the white residue on the base of the fixture.

Do Not Use Aerosol Products in Your Wallpapered Room

When I finish a wallpaper job, I like to give my clients (and especially their children) a “lecture” about care and feeding. You can read the full version of this on a page found at the right.

For now, I want to explain why not to use spray products in your room.

Avoid the use of any aerosol or air-borne substances such as hair spray, glass cleaner, air freshener, etc. Residue can hang in the air and will eventually find its way onto the wallpaper. Please see the above attached photos, where you can see tiny dots of shiny residue on the middle panel of the door, and in the second photo, on the wallpaper. Instead, use a solid air freshener, or the new “Poo-Pouri” type products that are not air-borne. When applying hair spray, step into the shower so any overspray will land on the tile walls, not on the wallpaper.

For cleaning the mirror, have the housekeeper spray the Windex on her RAG, not onto the MIRROR –this will prevent overspray from getting onto the wallpaper.

Mid Century Modern Bookshelves Get Grasscloth on Back

This 1960 ranch style home in the Westbury neighborhood of Houston is like a time capsule of Mid Century Modern design. The doors, windows, moldings, cabinetry, and even most of the bathrooms are original – and in mint condition. The homeowners love the look, and wanted to honor that, while updating some of the rooms. Grasscloth was all the rage in the ’60’s, so it was the perfect choice for the backs of these bookshelves in the family room.

I have to tell ya, covering this beautiful, original, perfectly maintained 1960 wood paneling with mud and a primer just about killed me. But since the wallcovering choice was grasscloth, the new look would be in keeping with the original feel of the house.

I don’t usually like grasscloth, because of the color variations (and many more reasons – do a Search – upper right corner) – But I was pleased with today’s product. The color was very uniform, and the material was very soft and pliable, as well as thin. It turned corners nicely and hugged the wall tightly.

This particular grasscloth has a bit more of a “nubby” texture than those with straight reeds, and this one had a nice sheen, too.

I wanted to avoid getting paste on that pristine wood, because I was afraid it might not wipe off without leaving residue, and also because I didn’t want to run a damp rag along the grasscloth, for fear of staining or bleeding. So I used my craft store cutting mat and a couple of different straightedges, to pre-trim the pieces to perfect right angels, so they would fit into the bookshelf alcoves, and also butt up against one another precisely.

I also used blue plastic tape (not shown) on the edges of certain pieces, to keep paste off the wood bookcase.

This grasscloth wallpaper is by Phillip Jeffries, a higher-end brand, 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.