Many of you were curious and reached out through comments, emails and private messages here and on Instagram after I shared glimpses into our dining room wallpaper hanging process last month – Thank you! – so I thought it would be interesting to share my experience in a blog post, in case you were considering a similar project in your home. I am by no means an expert, far from it, but the results were pretty great for a first try… Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links.
The degree of difficulty in wallpaper hanging depends on many factors, including your patience and attention to detail, and your willingness to see the process through (aka your level of stubbornness – the more stubborn, the better 🙂 ). As a disclaimer, I would not recommend starting out with expensive papers, and without consulting a few carefully selected sources. I have found Diane Carr’s book on wallpapering very helpful. If you add to that a couple of instructional Youtube videos, then you’re off to a great start.
An important thing to mention is that these suggestions will help you if you are using unpasted wallpaper. Many new wallpapers are now pre-pasted, which means the adhesive is already incorporated and all you need to do is activate it by spraying it with water.
Another thing I’d like to mention is that this was my first experience wallpapering and the stakes were pretty low for me, or I wouldn’t have done this as my first project. I had purchased four double rolls of an unpasted vintage paper (a reproduction of a historical print) and they sat in storage for a few months while we installed wainscoting on the lower part of the dining room walls. During that time I found a highly-recommended wallpaper hanger in our area but his waiting list was 2.5 months long so I decided to do it myself instead, and I’m very glad I did.
To give you an idea of the size of the project, our dining room is roughly 11’ x 11’ and it took me about a week to finish all four walls, working afternoons and two consecutive weekends. The useful thing I think was that the size of the wallpaper was manageable as we only had to install the paper above the chair rail. Each cut piece of wallpaper was no bigger than 20.5” x 55” ( 52” wall measurement + 3” allowance for matching the pattern at the seams) so I could do it all by myself. For full-length pieces I’d recommend working with a partner.
THE TOOLS I USED:
1. Special wallpapering adhesive – I used this one from Home Depot and absolutely loved it.
2. A wide brush with soft bristles (to spread the adhesive on the back of the paper) and a paint tray. I tried using a roller but it didn’t load enough adhesive so I switched to a large clean brush I had at home. Too much adhesive on the back will soften the paper and it will tear more easily, while too little adhesive will prevent the paper from sticking to the wall and you’ll end up with air pockets. To figure out a good pasting technique & amount I have found that it helps to practice on a few smaller pieces first.
3. A basic wallpaper kit from Amazon – it comes with a plumb line and white chalk – completely useless if your walls are white. My husband supplied the blue chalk which made the vertical lines more visible.
4. By far the most useful tool for hanging wallpaper was this smoothing tool from Amazon, which allowed me to remove all the air bubbles and achieve a tight bond. You just have to be very careful and wipe off any excess adhesive with a wet cloth before it dries.
5. A plastic drop cloth. This one from Home Depot was amazing – made of thick & sturdy plastic I could easily wipe clean and reuse throughout the project.
6. Microfiber cloths: I had two – a wet one and a dry one and I kept them both clean at all times. You’ll use the wet one to clean your work surface but also any adhesive that might have gotten on the front of the paper in the hanging / smoothing out process. After wiping down the plastic drop cloth with the wet micro fiber, I used the dry cloth to dry the surface before placing the next length of wallpaper, face down.
7. And last, a sturdy utility knife. I had this one from Home Depot and kept changing the blades often to ensure a clean cut.
One thing I did not invest in was a fancy wallpaper hanging table and instead I used a section of our kitchen floor onto which I taped a length of plastic drop cloth using painter’s tape. The plastic piece was wider and longer than my measured pieces of wallpaper so I won’t get adhesive all over our newly installed hardwood floors.
If you’re still interested and would like to try wallpaper hanging at home, here’s a rough outline of the process. If there are some unclear steps, please feel free to ask me in the comments.
THE PROCESS:
1. Decide on a starting point: Your first wall won’t be perfect so make sure to either practice on a large piece of foam board first (I didn’t do this but should have), just to figure out the amount of adhesive to apply on the back, and get comfortable with the smoothing tool, or start with a wall that won’t be as visible as the rest. The first wall I did is behind our dining room hutch so any imperfections are now conveniently concealed behind the furniture.
2. Once you’ve decided on a wall to start with, you have two options: you can start in the corner and work your way along the wall or, if your wall has a central focal point such as a window, a pair of French doors or a fireplace, mark and start in the center and work symmetrically toward the corners.
3. Measure out the exact length of wallpaper for the first piece and add an allowance for matching the seams. This allowance depends on the repeat of your pattern. For me the repeat was 2” so, for good measure, I added 3” (a bit much but wanted to be safe).
4. Next, use the plumb line and colored chalk (a laser level would have been ideal) to mark the vertical lines that delineate your first piece. If you hang this first piece well and make sure you perfectly match the seams as you go, your paper will be perfectly straight without your having to use the plumb line each time you hang a new piece.
5. Once you cut the wallpaper piece to your exact measurements + allowance, lay it down on the plastic drop cloth, making sure that the plastic sheet is clean and dry. This is very important! Fix the piece of wallpaper at the ends with two heavy weights (I used two levels) to keep it straight.
6. Apply the adhesive on the back using a wide brush, starting from the center of the paper, using gentle outward strokes all the while making sure that your paper doesn’t move. You can gently but firmly hold it with one hand while you’re brushing on the adhesive with the other.
7. Halfway through the first wall I realized that the wallpaper becomes more manageable as you are trying to install it if you fold the lower quarter, adhesive sides togheter. This way you can concentrate on attaching and smoothing out the top, and then deal with the bottom half.
8. The trickier part is to install the paper around doors and windows and I had two different approaches for this: the easier one is to use smaller, rectangular strips and just be very careful when matching the seams; the other is to cut a larger piece and attach it slowly working from top down, making sure you cut notches into the paper so that it folds around the trim gently, without tearing the paper. Both ways are fine but with the second technique you really need to be careful.
9. If you, like me, will make several mistakes along the way, there are easy solutions to remedy them. The first thing to note is that the adhesive dries slowly so you have about 20-25 min to work with each section of paper and, if necessary, you can remove the piece and reposition it multiple times until you get it right. Another thing that’s happened to me was that the edges at the top and bottom at times tore into the paper leaving a noticeable tear in the wallpaper. There’s an easy fix for that – just cut out a small matching piece from the existing paper, apply adhesive and patch the section up matching the pattern perfectly. Once the glues dries, the patch will blend seamlessly into the rest of the wall.
Overall, wallpaper hanging can be a very messy and repetitive process, and it is certainly not for everyone. However, if you are detail-oriented and patient, and you’re not afraid of making a few mistakes along the way, then the results will be immediate and remarkable. And once you get the hang of it (no pun intended 🙂 ), wallpaper hanging can be a very relaxing experience, very much like a form of meditation in which you must remain entirely focused and in the moment.
Anyway, I hope this answered some of your questions. Thanks for being such a supportive bunch!
