Tropical Foliage Re-Do – Peel & Stick Debacle UnDone

Re my previous post about an under-the-stairs powder room that the homeowners attempted to install an argumentative peel & stick material … here is the finished room after I stripped off the P&S, smoothed the walls, and hung the new wallpaper choice. I engineered to place the sole philodendron leaf down the center of the ceiling.

Where the under-the-stairs ceiling met the area over the door, the two surfaces came together in a very sharp angle. It was difficult to get in there and work, and to get the paper tight into the joint. Fingers can be too fat, so this is where tools can squeeze in there and save the day. This is also my kill point . Do a search here on that term for more info. A long story and maybe an hour or more of work, but you will note that there are no pattern mis-matches here. The homeowners were out of town, so I felt unpressured and could take as long as I needed to make these three areas look seamless.

I love the hand-painted, water colory look of this pattern.

This photo shows the joint where the walls meet the sloped under-the-stairs ceiling. A wallpaper pattern will never match perfectly in these situations. At first, I tried a few tricks to ” fool the eye .” But I decided it looked crisper and less distracting to just trim the two papers where they met. Here, we had the advantage that the tropical foliage pattern was busy enough that, I mean, really, when you step three feet back, who’s gonna notice a minor pattern mis-match, anyway? The pattern does match in the corners on either side behind the toilet, though (see photo). Even though this only 4.5″ high, it does lend subtle continuity to the room.

When I see Candice Olson, I fast forward to glitz and glam and glitter and shimmer. Here her tropical foliage design is a bit more main stream. York is the mother company, and I love their products.

This home is in the Heights neighborhood of central Houston.

Bold Watercolor Floral for a Toddler Girl’s Bedroom Accent Wall

Here’s a bolder twist on pastel flowers for a 2-year-old girl’s room. I’ve hung similar patterns for other little girls (do a Search here) done in this water-colory look, but in “sweeter” colors of pink and peach.

Interestingly, these all appear to be made by the same manufacturer (Sure-Strip, by York), but the design and colors have been changed just a bit, and then distributed through different vendors. Today’s was sold by Caitlin Wilson, but most of the others came from Anthropologie.

No matter who makes it and what brand is put on the label, this pattern is a wonderful choice for this young gal. The charcoal greys “grow it up” a little. It is not “babyish” and will grow with her, and can last well into her teen, and even college age, years.

The paper is wonderful to work with. It’s pre-pasted, which means it has paste on the back that is activated by running it through a water tray – as opposed to having to apply paste with a brush or roller to the back of the paper. It’s printed on a “non-woven” substrate, and is designed to strip off the wall easily and in one piece when it’s time to redecorate. Yet, unlike many non-woven materials, this one is thin and pliable and the seams lie very flat.

I hung this on one accent or feature wall in a newish home in the West University neighborhood of Houston.