Besides Law & Order SVU, my second favorite TV show is HGTV of course. From imagining living abroad with International House Hunting or day dreaming that one day Property Brothers will surprisingly show up in the front of my house and work their magic to get my house nice and pretty in a couple of hours 🙂 That’s not going to happen. So I can’t just sit around watching tv from the couch. From the previous post which is “Master Bedroom Problem, Solution, and Mood Boards”, I came up with a list of problems that I have with our bedroom and solutions that go along with it.
Starting with the problem No.1 – The room has a high ceiling, which I really love. But the openness can feel empty and cold sometimes. So my solution for this is to add a statement wall. It will create the focal point to the room and that is where eyes will go first. It will help eliminate the emptiness and also add character to the room. There are many options to create a statement wall: wall stencil, wall mural, wallpaper, contrast the wall with different shades of paint, wood plank wall and etc… Since we made a statement wall by painting a dark contrast color in our Creative Space, I wanted to try something different. From considering all the options, wallpaper is the way to go for this room. Wallpaper will help soften the space, add just the right texture to the wall, and create the serene look that I want. Also I have never put a wallpaper up so this is a good opportunity to get my hands on it.
Wallpaper samples
Choosing a wallpaper is fun to me, so much that I wanted to hang wallpapers on every single room in my house. And that’s a bad idea, I needed to pump the break on this because if I do that, this will be a crazy looking house. Let’s circle back and focus on this wall. After I looked around and ordered many samples I narrowed them down to these four patterns. It’s hard to see the colors and texture through your monitor screen. All of them have textures and some of them do have a silver sheen on them.
These four wallpaper samples had hung on the bedroom wall for about a week before I said yes to the one I liked (photo above). The process is similar to choosing a paint color. Have the samples hang on the wall through out the day and see how they affect the room; how they reflect natural light and a night light. It was not an easy pick. I liked them all but this one really stood out. It fits the key qualities I’m looking for which are serene and calm. My tip is if you don’t know where to start, start with two to three descriptive keywords and stay with it. I also think it’s ok to go slow or do it at your own pace. There were no rush in the process of choosing this wallpaper. I took my time and made sure that I really like this. Because if I put it on the wall and I end up hating it, then I would have to start all over. It’s better to take time.
Clean and smoothened
Hanging process
There are different types and method to install wallpaper; peel and stick, pre-pasted, etc.. The one I got is a removable wallpaper pasted to the wall. It means applying the paste (or the glue) onto the wall then placing the wallpaper onto the wall. I am not going to go into the detail of how to apply the wallpaper because different types of wallpaper have different processes. Most of them should come with instructions. But I have a general recommendation when work with wallpaper.
1. Clean and Smoothen the wall: fill in any holes on wall. It’s better to work with flat and clean surface.
2. Order extra rolls in one order: always order one or two rolls extra. And order them at the same time. Try not to order the same pattern in separate batch. It helps avoid color shifts from roll to roll.
3. Don’t follow the corner of the room: before hanging the first strip, make your own straight line. The line at the room corner is not always straight from top to bottom. The measurement will depend on the width of the wallpaper. This helps prevent tilted the wallpaper. For example, the width of my wallpaper is 20.47 inches. I drew the vertical line by using pencil and level and have it away from the corner about 19 inches. Then I lined up my first panel on to the line that I drew then second panel next to the first one and kept going until the end, then I went back to the empty panel. See mock up below.
4. Find the location of the next seam before pasting: after the first strip is on the wall, the second one or the next panel, do not glue it until you find where the pattern is line up.
5. There is going to be bubbles so don’t panic. Use the smoother to smooth the bubble out. Or quickly lift the area and paste it on the wall again.
6. Clean right away: if there are paste seeping through between the panel, wipe clean right away. Keep paper towel in handy.
7. Use the right tool: for my wallpaper I used smoother, roller and tray for pasted sheets, and a cutter.
8. Last, when cutting an excessive wallpaper try not to press too much pressure and go slow. Sometimes if you cut too fast your, hand could slip and slide the cutter to the area that you don’t mean to cut.
Details
This is an up-close super zoom view of the wallpaper. As I mentioned, this wallpaper have a nice texture.
Done
Before I started this diy I had many concerns … is it gonna work? What if I mess up? If I mess it up, do I have to repaint the entire wall? What if I don’t like this after it goes on the entire wall? But I did it anyway. I can’t keep doing things that I feel so comfortable all the time right? My thought on this do-it-your-self wallpaper as a first timer is that it is not hard as I though it would be. Even when I encounter problems, Google is alway there for me 🙂 But I would not say that it is easy, it is do-able. I was terrified to hang the first and the second strip of roll, but after the third panel, I felt more comfortable. And with all the worries that I had the result is much more rewarding. Now I can crossed off Problem No.1. There are 5 more to go… 😯
Your blog is very interesting. Thanks for sharing nice information.