I am not a fan of wallpaper in general, and the stuff in our house was truly horrible. Some of it was already peeling off, and the former owner had painted over some of it. So, I got the equipment needed and set to work. Here is what I learned, mostly the hard way:
Scraping: Wallpaper is glued to the wall most of the time. It’s not as easy as it looks when a convenient corner is hanging down. Most of the time, that corner tears off and you still have a wall covered in paper.
In order to get it off, you can use many different methods. Unfortunately, I didn’t have access to most of them. What I used was hot water and a putty knife. It was labor intensive and took several days per wall to get it all off.
Spackling: Using the above method left some very interesting gouge marks in the sheetrock. Thankfully, there is a compound designed to fill the holes with spackle. I think I went through two or three jars before all of the wallpaper was down.
Sanding: In order to have the spackled holes not point out that I’d had to use it, sandpaper must be applied. Again, I didn’t have something fast and easy, like an electric sander. Nope, it was all “Mary power.”
Primer: I have a story to illustrate the need for a good primer. One of the walls I worked on was covered in white wallpaper. It was one of those with corners tempting me to grab and pull. When I got this wallpaper off, it looked like my wall had measles. Whoever had put the paper up (probably another DIY housewife) had used big dots of red glue.
Not knowing about such things, I shrugged and grabbed my paint can. After two coats of paint, my wall *still* had measles. So, I went to the paint store and they asked if I’d used primer. Uh…what’s primer?
So, two coats of primer later, the measles were a little less obvious. Another two coats of paint, and you had to be looking for them to find them. However, when we called in a contractor to do the kitchen, he asked me why my wall had measles…
Primer is important to make an evenly shaded surface for the paint you want to be applied. It won’t conceal everything, but it is an important step.
Paint: There are two basic types of indoor wall paint. One is flat, which should be used on the actual walls. The other is semi-gloss, which is used for window frames, floor boards, etc. I can tell you from personal experience they are not interchangeable. Other types may be available, but these are the basics. The rest are variations on them.
If you are faced with wallpaper and you detest it as much as I do, I hope these tips will help. There are more tools available now to help make the job easier, so talk to your local paint shop before starting. It could save you a lot of extra work.