Wallpapering tips
24/01/09 Filed in: Home Improvement
Here's a tip. Don't get your wallpapering tips from the Detroit News!
I don't know much about anything, except, with 20 years experience in the painting and decorating trade, I have a fair idea about the intricacies of painting and wallpapering, and all that good home decor stuff. When I read this article in the Detroit News, I had to check the date of the article to see what century it had been written in.
The journalist must have got his info for this article from 1909, not 2009!
He is referring to the times when wallpaper came with selvedges, ie in the days before sellofane! Can't remember them days either?
Back in the day, manufacturers used to leave a raggedy border on the wallpaper as a form of protection for when it was being shipped and stacked on shelves. On the job, the tradesman would have to trim off this edging, as straight as possible by hand, before it was pasted. When it was time to hang, rather than butt joint each piece, they used to slightly overlap the joints, because despite their best efforts, the edges weren't always perfectly straight and an overlap was deemed better than a gap.
The selvedge is the origin of the following popular wallpapering tip:
The first piece of wallpaper should go down the side of a window, and you should then work away from the light, finishing in the corner that least attracts the eye when you walk in a room.
The reasoning behind this fairly reasonable advice comes from those good old days when decorators had to make sure that the unavoidable overlaps the idiotic journalist refers to, wouldn't cast a shadow!
I still hang paper this way, but the logic is a bit redundant, now that the wallpaper you get from 99% of sources is trimmed perfectly straight for you. Nowadays, the only time you should get an overlap in the middle of a wall is - never.
And finishing in the corner to the right of the door, usually works every time, unless you have an exorcist type head swivel going on.
What's the next tip from the Detroit News? Be careful not to spill molten horse hoof clippings on your hands when you are mixing your own paste!
If you want any serious home decorating advice, seriously, just ask. In amongst the satire there will be some useful tips.
I don't know much about anything, except, with 20 years experience in the painting and decorating trade, I have a fair idea about the intricacies of painting and wallpapering, and all that good home decor stuff. When I read this article in the Detroit News, I had to check the date of the article to see what century it had been written in.
If you have ever wallpapered a room, you know how difficult it has been to line up the designs from one strip of paper to the next. You would also have those noticeable seams due to the need to overlap one sheet over the other to match the patterns.
The journalist must have got his info for this article from 1909, not 2009!
He is referring to the times when wallpaper came with selvedges, ie in the days before sellofane! Can't remember them days either?
Back in the day, manufacturers used to leave a raggedy border on the wallpaper as a form of protection for when it was being shipped and stacked on shelves. On the job, the tradesman would have to trim off this edging, as straight as possible by hand, before it was pasted. When it was time to hang, rather than butt joint each piece, they used to slightly overlap the joints, because despite their best efforts, the edges weren't always perfectly straight and an overlap was deemed better than a gap.
Wallpapering tip 2
The selvedge is the origin of the following popular wallpapering tip:
The first piece of wallpaper should go down the side of a window, and you should then work away from the light, finishing in the corner that least attracts the eye when you walk in a room.
The reasoning behind this fairly reasonable advice comes from those good old days when decorators had to make sure that the unavoidable overlaps the idiotic journalist refers to, wouldn't cast a shadow!
I still hang paper this way, but the logic is a bit redundant, now that the wallpaper you get from 99% of sources is trimmed perfectly straight for you. Nowadays, the only time you should get an overlap in the middle of a wall is - never.
And finishing in the corner to the right of the door, usually works every time, unless you have an exorcist type head swivel going on.
Wallpapering tip 3
What's the next tip from the Detroit News? Be careful not to spill molten horse hoof clippings on your hands when you are mixing your own paste!
If you want any serious home decorating advice, seriously, just ask. In amongst the satire there will be some useful tips.
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Cheers, Ed