Works For Me Wednesday: Wallpaper Woes
Wednesday, May 12, 2010 at 7:00AM MAD21 By MAD21
Last week, the host of this carnival, Kristen, had a themed week where we were to ask our readers about something that "Works for Them." I had an insane week, and didn't have time to write my post then, so I'm doing it this week.
To say I am not a big fan of wallpaper is an understatement. But when we bought our house almost ten years ago, it was full of it. The previous owners had good friends who were professional decorators, who were apparently not people who had issues with wallpaper. But it was all very well done and it looked beautiful... save for one room.
At the time it was no big deal that this particular room had plain country blue (with a very fine dot/flower detailing) wallpaper. It was a spare room. However, ten years later, it is now my oldest's room. Her walls are covered with her artwork and various other things, so it's not really a big deal. But I would LOVE to redo her room and make it look more girlie. And as of late, my daughter agrees. Just last week she asked if we could "paint it or something."
I have been pondering exactly how to tackle the walls in this room for over a year now. When we first moved her into that room just before her sister joined the family, we hung some shelves. It took us over two hours to get them hung because the drywall is very brittle and kept breaking as we were trying to get the screws in to hold the shelves.
I'm worried that if we start messing with the walls, that we will have to all-out replace the drywall in the whole room which equals lots of time and money. For all of you crafty people out there... HELP! Here is my question to you:
What is the best (and easiest) way to either remove wallpaper from fragile drywall or cost effective ways to paint or redecorate over the top of it. OR... is it better to just replace the drywall?
Every Wednesday, fellow blogger Kristen at We are THAT Family posts clever ideas for getting things done. She calls it, "Works For Me Wednesday" or WFMW. Be sure to go visit her blog to read her post along with links to other blogs who are participating.
Reader Comments (3)
Ugh. I feel your pain. We had some wallpaper in our kitchen that we didn't like so we set out to remove it. We rented a steaming machine and got a scoring tool (to perforate the paper so the steam could get in). After nearly a day, we had very little done and we're very frustrated. I talked to a friend who does remodeling for a living and he said that if you fill a spray bottle with warm water and fabric softener that it would loosen the glue underneath. This was a whole lot cheaper and worked better than the machine, but it still took a long time. We would spray it then use a tool to scrape it off. It was halfway done for quite a while, but we finally made it through!
Wow, wish I knew how to help. I think I'd be nervous about doing much wallpaper-removal if the walls are kind of crumbly already. What do you think about going to the paint dept. at the hardware store and seeing if they have anything to recommend that can paint right over it?
I feel your pain when it comes to wallpaper. I can't stand it, yet every house we buy seems to be covered in yards of it. We rented a steamer for the first time a few months ago and it worked wonders, but there was still damage to the drywall no matter how careful we tried to be. If your wallpaper doesn't have a raised pattern or texture and seems to be stuck pretty well, I would try painting over it. I did that in another room recently and it looks great. I'm pretty sure I will do it in my bathroom too whenever I finally get around to re-doing it. Here's a post I did about painting over wallpaper...
http://grooviemom.blogspot.com/2010/01/favorite-projects-of-2009-part-3.html