How to hang wallpapers, about Dopati wallpaper and where all can you use them

I think I first mentioned about my Dopati wallpaper in january, when the wallpaper was still in production. Cut to now, we have sold about 12 pieces and are going super strong with another plant inspired wallpaper in line.

That’s all cool right? So what did you miss? Nothing really, just a good tutorial as to how to hang wallpaper, where you can use wallpapers, what kind of glue is required and what kind of wallpapers should you choose. Wait. And why did you miss that? Because the blog just did not budge from draft. Believe me I tried. Its not me 🙂

Silliness aside, since I launched my wallpaper and since we had it off to the stockist we’ve had a million questions regarding how to hang wallpapers and how to remove them or is there an alternative to sticking wallpapers because most of you live on rent and it was hi time I addressed this. While abroad the idea of wallpapering is pretty common- and it’s becoming common here- in India there is still a dearth of info and products when it comes to wallpapering, and most people who provide the service of wallpapering aren’t aware of the exact techniques either. We’ve had so many people inquire and tell us that they want to buy but they don’t know the whereabouts that we had to reschedule our tub post and get this one out first. But assure you the tub post is on its way. 

Here we go then.

Our wallpapers follow a 1″ overlap. What does that mean?

First things first. If you bought our Dopati wallpapers, you must have seen on the right hand side there is a half repeat of the flower pot. That’s not a flaw, that’s an one inch overlap. Which means, when you add the second wallpaper by its side, you will place wallpaper 2 on top of wallpaper 1: the overlapping will be of 1″ width. Why is this done? So it looks seamless and the edges are not visible. When you are learning how to hang wallpaper, learn if the paper has any specific instructions.

Straight match or Drop match


Now wallpapers come in straight match- which are wallpapers when placed side by side have the same pattern in grids, horizontally.
A drop match is one where the pattern moves up or down. So basically, the object on the left edge of the wallpaper will drop halfway down the length of the pattern repeat.
Ours is straight match. No complications for now!

How to hang wallpapers: Wall prep

How to hang wallpaper comes later. First, it’s your walls. If your wall is leaky, mouldy and is suffering from peeling paint, you HAVE to address that first before you wallpaper. Just covering it won’t sort anything. But if your walls are perfectly fine and have no leakage or seepage problems, you will need to remove dirt. You can do it with a nice, dry coarse cloth and fill the holes or cracks with fillers- I use putty or white cement. If you have a wall that’s gloss painted, you will have to sand it down. Also, if you have absorbent surfaces like new plaster, you will need to size it {sealing it with sizing solution}. I think for wooden walls, you will need to fill cracks and clean the surface before wallpapering it

How to hang wallpaper in two ways


If you are looking at putting up a wallpaper, please measure the length of the walls and cut your wallpaper to about 2″ extra. This will give you room for adjustment which you can later cut off with an exacto knife. You will need wallpaper paste for this. Lay out your wallpaper, add glue evenly and start pasting top first, smoothing as you proceed.
If you are in a rented place and your landlord wont allow you to glue the walls, you can use very small nails and add wallpaper to your walls. Add the nails in the coloured section or if you’re using on white surface, paint the nail heads white. See here
I have also put a video here

Wallpaper glue: What glue should you use

There are loads of wallpaper glue available in the market- from liquidy glues to pastes and powder. Speak to your wallpaper provider as to what glue works best. Honestly, 2 part fevicol and 2 part water also works.

Where all can you use wallpaper

Now, ladies and gents, wallpaper is not just for walls. You can very well use it on your tiles and furniture too should you feel it needs some pattern and texture love. For furniture though, its gotta be fevicol. Nothing else. 1:1 ratio.

How to remove wallpaper

For removing wallpaper, you will need a stripping solution or a wallpaper steamer. If it’s not the peelable one that is. For this, take professional help! I have always hung mine with little nails so when I take the paper off, I take the nails away and fill the holes with putty. Finito.

Where can you buy our wallpaper


You can tell us in the comments, write to me at [email protected] or head straight to BubblewrapStore who stocks our wallpaper. Here’s the link. Our wallpapers are not self adhesive but needs adhesive to be hung. Also, do remember, the pattern has a one inch overlap!

Realtime project feature

A very sweet girl and a reader, and one of our first buyers redid her wash basin area tiles and her hutch with our wallpaper and the result is brilliant. See how pretty her hutch turned out! Krittika, it was great to know a super happy, rusti-vintage-white loving lady like you!

Follow her on instagram to see the washbasin!

Well then, that’s it! If you want to know how to hang wallpapers, here’s pretty much a crash course on the same and which will kind of tell you whats what. In end, how difficult can spittin, grittin and ducktapin be huhh? Haha, pretty difficult actually. So do a bit of reading before you embark on that wallpaper project. Trust me, aint no horrible a thing than a stretch of puffy mismatched wallpaper!

Happy craftin. You now know how to hang wallpaper!
Rukmini

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