This couple in a nicely updated 1939 home in the Montrose neighborhood of Houston has a blank wall in the back of their large walk-in closet. They have a lot of colorful , modern art and wanted a backdrop for it that would be fun, but wouldn’t compete .One of the gals is an administrator for the athletic department in a local school district – so this small print “ Swimmers “ design is just perfect. In fact, the day I hung this, she was away at a swim meet in Austin ! Note that Spoonflower offers scores of designs under the “ Swimmers “ name, so be sure to check all of them, and all the colorways they come in, too. Detail Spoonflower is a little different from most wallpaper companies, in that it’s material comes in individual panels, or sheets – which they call rolls . Each of these is 24” wide, and then you choose the length you want, between 3’, 6’, 9’, and 12’. Each roll comes nicely packaged in an individual thick plastic zip-lock bag . These ones are upside down, so I had to re-roll them so the pattern would be coming off the top of the roll . Here are some tips about hanging Spoonflower. First of all, I like their “ Pre-Pasted Smooth Removable “ option. And it’s the only one I’ll work with. Their “ Traditional Pebble “ is a heavy vinyl that requires special trimming , bubbles, and is better suited for commercial spaces. And, the Peel & Stick – well, everyone ought to forget that sad stuff. Please read my link to the right about that material. In this photo, you can see that the white material is thin and translucent , allowing things underneath to show through, sort of like a shadow . So I need to be careful to make my pencil marks and notes on the wall very lightly. Side note: Never write on the wall or paper with ink or marker or crayon or grease pencil – it will bleed through the wallpaper . This is a pre-pasted material , meaning that a thin layer of paste is already applied to the back. To activate the paste , all you need to do is dip it in water , run it through a water tray , or spritz the back with a squirt bottle (uneven and kills your wrist) . Their paste is quite adequate. But I do like to have a little extra assurance, so I will roll on a little of my Roman 780 wallpaper paste onto the back. Then I take a sponge and drip clean water from a bucket onto the back of the paper . Next I use a paint roller to spread the mixture of water and paste around the back . This both activates the pre-paste, and also spreads around a little extra adhesive . Next, the paper gets folded pasted-side-to-pasted-side ( called booking ), then rolled or folded loosely. I like to dip the ends of the rolled strip into a bucket of water – just 1/8” or so, to prevent them from drying out while booking. Then the strip is placed in a plastic trash bag to prevent it from drying out during the booking period – a few minutes. I use this time to paste and book my next strip . Spoonflower Pre-Pasted Smooth is a little different from most papers, because it’s designed to be overlapped at the seams. Here I am lining up a seam. This overlap does show as a ½” wide ridge along the entire length of each strip. With busy patterns, it’s not very visible. Even with sparse designs like this one, once it’s dry and flat, you don’t notice. Here’s the overlapped seam looking toward the light, which is leaving a very minor shadow. And the overlap can be a good thing. For starters, most wallpapers shrink a little when the paste dries, so you can end up with slight gaps at the seams. Overlapping eliminates that. Also, if a wall is unstable underneath, due to incompatible layers of paint , or dusty walls, or other, the tension of these drying strips of paper can cause the layers inside the wall to come apart / delaminate – and that will result in paper that comes away from the wall, taking layers of paint and etc. along with them. This usually cannot be repaired or “ glued back down .” (Do a Search here to learn more) So overlapping the seams disperses the tension caused by the drying paper, and eliminates any seam from landing on the wall (because the sheets are overlapped ), so no popped seams .Here is the seam looking away from the light.Because Spoonflower Smooth Pre Pasted is thin paper and water-activated , it absorbs a lot of moisture from the water. So the material can’t help but expand . This can result in bubbles on the wall. Also, when air pockets develop, there is nowhere for the air to escape, so, again, bubbles and blisters. If there are huge bubbles, it may be worth taking a brush or plastic smoother and chasing them out. Or using a pin or razor blade to poke tiny holes to let the air out. But, really, if you can just relax and let nature take its course, as the paper dries, these bubbles will dry flat and disappear. Trust me. Another thing that can happen is wrinkles . These tend to form in the same place on every strip , and coordinate with how the paper was booked and rolled after pasting . The worst of these can be chased out with a plastic smoother. But there are dangers to over-using the smoother tools. Doing so can stretch the wallpaper and cause it to warp, which means the pattern might not match up perfectly on the next strip. Or it might cause wrinkles that can’t be brushed out. Again – if you can just sit tight and let the paper dry naturally, the creases and folds will disappear. I did some experimenting and found that booking and then rolling the strip up like a newspaper resulted in more wrinkles.It worked better to paste, book, and then fold gently and loosely. Then into the plastic bag to sit for a few minutes . Spoonflower PrePasted Removeable Smooth . I like this stuff. Removeable means that it’s designed to strip off the wall easily and with no/minimal damage to your wall when you redecorate down the road. I suspect this is made by York , as it’s very similar to their SureStrip line . Good stuff. The order comes with a mock-up of the strips / rolls you’ve purchased.Install instructionsPromo info from Spoonflower .
Beware that some papers are thinner and more see-through than others. Look closely, and you can see the shadow of the wallpaper inked pattern underneath this top layer of wallpaper. Nothing wrong with this. Just something to be cognizant of. So just be sure to not write too heavily on the wall,* nor to make dark pencil marks on the back of the wallpaper.* Because they may telegraph through to the surface after the wallpaper is up. *For instance, I write measurements, and also notes like strip sequence on the wall. And on the back of the paper, I always mark the top of each strip, and also the number / sequence each strip should be placed on the wall. Also just a note – always write in pencil , or chalk. NEVER make marks on the paper or on the wall in ink or marker – these substances bleed through wallpaper, paint, and other materials, and will leave a nasty stain on the surface of the paper.
Panel of wallpaper lying on my pasting table. The left edge will go up against a painted wall that is not to be wallpapered. It’s important to keep paste off this wall, because the paste can cause the paint to crackle and flake off. Yes, you can wipe paste off the wall, especially if it’s a gloss paint. But better to not get paste on the wall in the first place. So I’ve placed a strip of this cool blue plastic tape along the edge. It sticks to the pasted wallpaper, but will not let paste get onto the wall. Here is the wallpaper in place, with the little 1″ overage wrapping onto the wall to the left. See how the blue tape is preventing paste from getting onto the wall? Once I finish trimming, I will remove both the excess paper and the blue tape. Be sure to remove any blue tape that is still behind the wallpaper. This also works for ceilings and for abutting another strip of wallpaper. This tape is much better than painter’s plastic or ” caution tape ” because it is lightly tinted so you can see it, it’s translucent so you can see through it, it has the perfect body – thicker than painter’s plastic but more flexible than caution tape, and has a unique textured surface that makes it handle nicely, plus you can easily snap it apart so there is no need for scissors or razor blades. It’s made in Japan and tricky to get. If you’re interested, email me at wallpaperlady@att.net and I’ll hook you up with the supplier. The very edgy wallpaper? It’s by Spoonflower and called Serpents and Apples .
In anticipation of this accent wall mural, the parents had the three other walls painted a soft salmon-y pink. Finished! I love the way the pattern ” crescendos ” toward the center and top…. perfect for cradling the crib. The blotchy look will disappear as the wallpaper dries, and the background will become more bright white. The mural came a set size, of 12.5′ W x 9′ H. The width fit the wall with just a few inches extra, which was perfect. But the wall was less than 8′ high and the mural was 9′, so we lost about 12″ of the mural. I brought the design as close to the ceiling as I could, while still preserving that light blue flower at the center top. This meant that most of the pattern lost was from the bottom, which has more stems and flowers – but not as pretty as the elements toward the top. And most of the bottom is going to be hidden by the crib and other furnishings, anyway. Also note that the right side of the mural pattern does not match up with the pattern on the left. Meaning, the mural does not continue from one mural to the next. This means that, if you have a really wide wall, for instance, or a powder room more than 12′ wide, you cannot place two or more murals next to each other and have the pattern continue uninterrupted. This is pretty standard for Anewall murals. But there are tons of other mural manufacturers who do make products that will accommodate wider spaces. And that are also custom-sized to your rooms’ specific dimensions. Close-up looks like a translucent watercolor painting. The pattern is called Wildflower . Cute hidden creatures like this snail. On her own, the mom originally purchased a peel & stick mural. Once she contacted me, I set her straight on how … err … awful that stuff is. (Click the link on the right to read my page about this material.) The company allowed her to send the P&S back and exchange it for this better quality pre-pasted option, which I like a lot. (I’m not fond of their traditional which is vinyl and requires special install techniques). Still, we had some issues which I’ve come to expect from Anewall, such as gaps and overlaps at the seams, and some minor pattern mis-matches at the seams . This is a newish home in the League City area of Houston.
Powder room before.Powder room after the introduction of various bugs, insects, critters and creepy crawlers.The homeowner loves bugs. She likes this view so much that she said she might not cover it with a mirror. Who needs a mirror in a powder room, anyway?This powder room is under the stairs, hence the sloped ceiling. The wallpaper has the look of botanical identification prints, in a dreamy shade of blue. Mind the Gap is the manufacturer, and the pattern is called Entomology. The material comes as a 3- roll / strip set. It’s a non-woven product, so you can hang it by pasting the wall. Although I usually choose to paste the paper. Interestingly, this paper was lot thinner and crisper than the black Aquafleur by the same brand I hung a couple of weeks ago. In fact, it was quite translucent. I had to not make pencil marks on the walls nor on the back of the paper, for fear they would show through the front. This stuff is also very curly – meaning that it wants to stay tightly rolled up. Two days before the install, I asked the homeowner to roll the material backward and secure with an elastic hairband, to relax the curl. This worked wonderfully, and I had nice flat sheets to work with. The pattern is essentially a mural, spread across three strips that connect to the next set of three strips. The pattern does not repeat. That means that it takes one full ” roll” for each strip. Since the rolls are 10′ long and the walls in this bathroom were less than 8′, there was more than 2′ of paper cut off and thrown away, for each of 15 strips around the room. The two 8″ high strips over the door would also have each used up a full 10′ roll. But I did a little measuring and plotting and trimming and used scraps for this area. This also enabled me to put bugs that had not been seen on any of the other strips up over the door. Because this space was only 8″ high, I had to find insects that were small – didn’t want anyone to get his legs or antenna cut off! Sorry, I forgot to get a photo of that area. This room had some tricky spaces. Besides the sloped ceiling, which presented challenges of its own too complicated to delve into here, the 2″ gap you see next to the vanity in the top photo … the wide strip on the wall with the hand towel ring, plus the 2″ wide strip between the vanity and that wall probably took me a full 40 minutes to get in place. The townhome is in the Galleria / Highland Village neighborhood of Houston.
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.
I guess that Serena & Lily is starting to print on non-woven substrates. I am not a fan (see yesterday’s post).
Besides being very stiff and uncooperative, this material is very translucent. As you see in the photo, the leaves of the second layer of wallpaper are clearly visible through the top layer.
This means that it’s likely that color imperfections on the wall will show through. New Sheetrock, for example, with its grey drywall interspersed with bands of white joint compound. Or hanging this product on a dark painted wall will result in a “dirty” cast underneath the paper, and will not yield the bright, crisp white look that S&L is known for.
As a primer, I like Roman’s Pro 977 Ultra Prime, which is a white-pigmented primer, and an ideal choice under thin, see-through material like this. But it is not a heavily-pigmented primer, so there is still the worry that the finished walls will not look as bright as they should.
I do hope that S&L will improve this product. There are tons of nice non-wovens available, so let’s hope they do some research and come up with a better substrate.
When hanging wallpaper, the last corner (kill point) of a room virtually always ends in a pattern mis-match. That’s why you try to tuck it in an inconspicuous corner, like a short strip over a door.
In this case, I was going to end up with a medallion that got chopped in half vertically. Not horrible, because that is just the nature of the beast. But I had an idea to make it look better.
Using my straightedge, I sliced off the medallion. Then I found a scrap of wallpaper that was plain white (the background color) and trimmed that to fill the width where the medallion had been. Success!
But there was still a quarter medallion showing at the ceiling line on the adjacent wall.
My solution was to again take some left over wallpaper. I cut a shape that mimicked the motif on the wall, and pasted it on top. Nice!
Only problem is, the paper is somewhat translucent, and so a “ghost” of the image under the paper is showing through.
No problem. I cut another patch, just slightly larger to “feather out” the light bump from the difference in heights of the patches. Once it was pasted on top, it occluded the “shadow” of the medallion. From the floor, you can’t see a thing.
In the final photo, the distance between the medallions is wider than it “should” be – by maybe as much as 2.5″. But this is barely noticeable, and is way better than having a chopped-in-half medallion below plus a quarter medallion above.
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