Most days we don't notice that the house doesn't look how we'd like it. We're usually too busy, doing what I'm not exactly sure, but messing about online is definitely one of the reasons why we don't see the horrible walls.
One of the main reasons the walls look so unsightly is that when we purchased the house it needed to be fully rewired, which left great big chases, from floor to ceiling, down almost every wall in the property.
Another reason the house isn't looking its best is the wallpaper; pink flowers and swirls are not something we like.
Yesterday, as I sat playing about online, I glanced up and said to myself 'I can't stand to look at that wallpaper for a day longer', and with that I had the sudden urge to jump up and rip the wallpaper off of the living room walls. So that's exactly what I did.
Well, sort of. What I actually did was tear off a small section of wallpaper, by small I mean not quite all of the wallpaper that was, and partly still is, covering the chimney breast.
My sudden urge to rip off the wallpaper was mainly because I wanted to see how difficult it was going to be to strip, or hopefully how easy it was going to be to strip it off.
The wallpaper is as you can see from the photos, a very thick embossed paper.
The design of the wallpaper is not to our taste, in fact we don't like wallpaper at all, no matter what the design. It wouldn't make any difference if the wallpaper was seriously cool, abstract, one-of-a-kind, handpainted, or any other description you can think of - we just don't like wallpaper.
What we do like is beautifully painted white walls.
I know some people may find white walls, well, dull, but we like them because they are anything but dull, they are uplifting, fresh, and light. And white walls help make your bits and bobs stand out, not that we have any as we gave away everything we owned when we went off travelling, but that's a different story.
Thankfully I was able to strip the wallpaper quite easily, just using my thumb and finger nails. I didn't want to make the walls damp, or use a scraper, because sometimes I'm heavy handed and I didn't want to damage the walls.
I had help as I ripped the wallpaper off of the chimney breast, not from Mr.R who was busy cooking our lunch, but from our gorgeous dog Barley. Although Barley loves paper, he's more interested in eating it than stripping it off of the walls. So he wasn't really much help, but I thought it was nice that he wanted to be involved.
Unfortunately, even before I began to tear the wallpaper off of the living room wall, I knew that having the beautiful plain white walls we would like was not going to happen. The walls are not in good condition, and I'm pretty certain that in most of the rooms it's only the wallpaper that's keeping the plaster on the walls.
So, when I started to rip the wallpaper off of the chimney breast in the living room, I was quite pleased that it was only the top heavily embossed layer that came off. The thin layer underneath is still on the walls, and that's where I'm leaving it. It is as I said helping to keep the plaster on the walls.
We are in no mood to mess about re-plastering walls. Many many years ago when we lived in London we completely renovated our huge house, and neither of us particularly want to get our hands that dirty ever again. Ever.
Now that I have, more or less, less actually, stripped the wallpaper from the chimney breast, I am left wondering what to cover it with.
I'd love to paint it white, but it would look rough. So, I'll have to think of something else.
Or more likely I shall just leave the wall as it is. It doesn't look that bad. Obviously I am joking - about it looking bad, not about leaving the wall as it is. I'm a happy procrastinator.
But I don't really notice it, well, only when I look up from using the internet. And that's how this mess started, so I definitely won't be making that mistake again in a hurry.
Wallpaper? Paint? Or something else?
I'd like to hear what you love for your interior design.
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