How to glue wallpaper and wallpaper borders

Recommendation points

• How to choose wallpaper
• Materials and tools
• Step by step wallpapering
• Preparing walls for gluing
• Wallpaper pasting process
• Minor wallpaper repair
• Curbs. Their purpose
• Sticking borders
• Curbs around a door or window
• Tips for choosing wallpaper and renovating a room

Many are afraid of repairing an apartment, especially if they are going to do it themselves. But, as they say, fear has big eyes. With proper planning and distribution of forces, repairs can be done in a fairly short time and even without helpers. In this article, the conversation will focus on one of the stages of repair – gluing wallpaper.

How to choose wallpaper

When starting a repair, in particular, if you want to change the wallpaper, do not rush to the store and buy rolls in a hurry, even if you like them. It happens that first they buy wallpaper, and only then they think where to stick it, maybe in the room, or maybe in the corridor. It is much more difficult to choose wallpaper than, for example, paint for walls (some people prefer to paint the walls), since you choose both color and pattern at the same time.

Experts offer some advice.

Start with the design of the room. Find pictures or photographs from magazines of the rooms you like, select the colors you would like to use. Set the right mood.

Choose wallpaper based on the style of the room. If this is a room in a romantic style, then the wallpaper will be muted, pastel colors with a delicate floral pattern..

For rooms in a modern, fashionable style, wallpaper with a clear, embossed geometric pattern with a metallic tint is suitable. A traditional room can be pasted over, for example, with wallpaper with stripes or in a damask style, which are perfectly combined with the usual decor and decoration of the room..

Left: Striped wallpaper. Right: Damascus style

When choosing wallpaper, be guided by the degree of light in your room. It is better to paste over light rooms with cold-colored wallpaper: silver, blue, etc. For dark rooms, light colors with small patterns or ornaments are more suitable. Warm tones of wallpaper, apricot, golden, orange, will help to visually expand and illuminate the room.

Once at the store, take your time to choose a wallpaper. Take your time with the purchase. It is advisable to get three or four samples of the wallpaper you like. They can also be bought in our time in the online store..

At home, hang samples on the wall. You need to “live” with the new wallpaper for a few days, walk around, see if you feel comfortable with the selected samples.

Pay attention to the material from which the wallpaper is made and their lifespan. For rooms, simple paper wallpaper is recommended, for the kitchen – washable, vinyl, the imperfections of uneven walls can be hidden with non-woven wallpaper.

You do not need to completely wallpaper the walls – use borders (they will be discussed below), combine patterns and colors.

Highlight one of the walls, for example, behind a sofa or bed, pasting it with bright wallpaper with a clear pattern with a metallic or glossy accent, which will give the room a stylish and elegant look (see photo below).

Currently, there are many types of wallpaper: paper, vinyl, textile, liquid.

Paper wallpaperwidely used due to their low cost and simple gluing process. They “breathe”, slightly reduce the thermal conductivity of the walls. The disadvantage of such wallpapers is their fragility and low strength, which affects when gluing (they can tear when wet).

Vinyl wallpapersthey are resistant to light, waterproof, durable and elastic. The disadvantage of vinyl wallpaper is that it is difficult to work with them – when glue is applied, they stretch a lot, and when they dry, on the contrary, they shrink. As a result, the seams can separate, leaving gaps between the canvases..

Textile wallpaperhave high noise-absorbing and heat-insulating properties. A special type of textile wallpaper is velor. Velor fibers are applied to the paper base, resulting in a soft, velvety surface. The only thing is that such wallpapers require special care, as they collect dust..

Liquid wallpaperhave become quite popular recently. They allow you to create coatings without seams. This material is diluted with paint and applied with a roller. The advantage of wallpaper is that it can be applied to concrete, plasterboard surfaces.

Among the large selection of wallpapers there are textured wallpapers with natural fibers, as well as non-woven ones, which can give your room a special look, and the walls have a certain depth and relief, thereby hide the unevenness of the walls, since the wallpaper itself is thick.

Textured non-woven wallpaper is convenient in that it can be painted in any color you like, since they are produced mainly in white. It should be borne in mind that the final color of the wallpaper will differ from the color of the paint. It is recommended to test a small area of ​​the wallpaper before painting. Experts recommend painting 2-3 times. After staining, the wallpaper becomes resistant to water and mechanical damage. The wallpaper can even be patterned as you wish..

Blank patterns

The basis of such wallpaper is a non-woven material with unusual properties:

• they are easy to stick on the wall;
• when gluing wallpaper, you need to apply glue only to the wall, which significantly reduces the gluing time;
• when wet, they are not deformed or torn;
• have a high level of breathability;
• they can be painted several times;
• easily removed if you want to change the wallpaper;
• are hard to ignite;
• shelf-life Unlimited.

Before buying wallpaper, calculate the area of ​​the room so as not to be mistaken with the number of rolls. The consultant in the store can help you calculate the number of glue and rolls, or you can do it yourself. Count the number of canvases: to do this, measure the length and width of the room, fold them, you get the perimeter of the room. Divide the perimeter by the width of the wallpaper (approximately 0.53 meters). Let’s say the perimeter is 20 meters, then the number of rolls will be 37.7 – round up. Receive 38 canvases. The length of the canvases is calculated as follows: the number of canvases is multiplied by the height of the walls (add 10 cm to the height for alignment). If the height of the walls is 3 meters, then the length of the canvases will be 114 cm.Divide the resulting length of the canvases by the length of the wallpaper in a roll – get the number of rolls – 12 pieces (again, round the resulting number up, an extra roll will not hurt).

Materials and tools

You will need the following tools:

• level
• spatula for smoothing wallpaper
• seam smoothing roller
• wallpaper cutter
• bucket and sponge
• roller
• wallpaper glue

Step by step wallpapering

Preparing walls for gluing

Gone are the days when it was easier to take out a wall than scraping old wallpaper off the wall. Now the wallpaper is quite easy to glue and remove if you are tired. There are, for example, wallpapers in which, when removed, the upper layer is removed, the lower one remains on the wall, so the walls are ready for pasting new wallpaper. Nevertheless, if the wallpaper is ordinary, then you can remove it as follows.

Prepare some kind of floor protector, a wallpaper scraper, a wallpaper softener and glue remover, and a glue scraper if the glue is difficult to remove. To make it easier to remove the wallpaper, moisten it with a special compound or with a mixture of one glass of vinegar and warm water.

Before starting work, cover the floor near the wall with paper or cellophane to get rid of unnecessary garbage collection. Scrape the surface of the wallpaper with a metal brush, moisten with the prepared mixture and leave for a while. After about 30 minutes, try to remove the canvas by grasping the corner of the canvas (photo below).

Try not to tear the wallpaper. If done correctly, the entire strip will go away

Otherwise, repeat the whole process again, or scrape off the remnants of the wallpaper with a soft scraper so as not to damage the plaster (photo below).

In order for the new wallpaper to please the eye for a long time, uneven walls must be leveled: cover the cracks with plaster, re-plaster the damaged areas, sand the surface with sandpaper.

Remember to keep your windows tightly closed during and after pasting the room! Dry wallpaper is afraid of draft.

Before direct gluing, the surface of the wall is primed with a special compound that is suitable for the selected wallpaper, for better adhesion of the wallpaper to the wall. Priming will additionally level the wall surface.

Wallpaper pasting process

Unroll the rolls and check for defects, whether the rolls match in tone. Pay attention to this while still in the store. Rolls must be from the same batch.

Cut the canvases about 10 cm (6 in) to fit, especially if the wallpaper is patterned. Lay the canvases pattern side down. Apply glue with a roller. Smear the edges of the canvases well. Try to keep the glue from staining your work surface.

Fold the spread over the canvas so that the ends meet in the middle of the canvas. Set the blank aside to absorb the glue. Observe the times indicated on the wallpaper instructions. For vinyl wallpaper, the dwell time is longer than, for example, with simple paper.

Start gluing the wallpaper from the corner near the door. If the door is far from the corner, draw a line parallel to the door. Take the wallpaper by the top edge and glue it to the wall with a 10 cm margin. Press down lightly. Unfold the bottom edge, make sure the canvas is parallel to the door and glue the bottom of the canvas.

After leveling the canvas, gently smooth the wallpaper in the corner near the ceiling with a wallpaper smoothing trowel. Then, moving from top to bottom, smooth the entire canvas. Trim the excess paper near the ceiling with a knife.

Next, stick the stripes, adjusting according to the picture. If the wallpaper shrinks as it dries, overlap the wallpaper so that the seams do not come apart. Smooth the wallpaper gently from the center to the edges without leaving any air bubbles. Remove excess glue with a sponge or clean cloth.

When pasting sections of the wall near doors and windows, leave a margin of about 2 cm from the edge of the canvas, which is adjacent to the platbands. Press the edge firmly against the door trim and carefully cut off any excess wallpaper with a knife. Smooth the entire canvas.

Flaws when gluing or cutting wallpaper can be corrected by painting them with a marker of a suitable color.

Some people, when renovating, paste over the frames of the outlets with wallpaper to hide the outlets. To do this, cut a piece of wallpaper larger than the frame itself. Please note – the drawing of the cut-out piece must match the drawing with the main background around the outlet. Then apply glue to the frame, place it face down on the prepared piece of wallpaper, attach it to the outlet and adjust the pattern. Then you need to cut the corners, fold the edges of the wallpaper and secure them with tape (see photo below). Cut the holes with a knife. Screw the frame onto the socket.

Minor wallpaper repair

The renovation was done several years ago, and it lasted more than one week, and maybe more than one month. The wallpaper was torn somewhere or the edges “moved away” from the wall, the child put his hand, showed artistic talents on the walls, the dog wiped himself off, left “traces” on the wallpaper in the corridor. What to do? To re-glue? Experts offer some tips for minor repairs:

• After renovation, leave one roll or at least a few large pieces of wallpaper that you may need for restoration..
• Basically, the “detached” edges are enough to glue, but in some cases it is necessary to replace the damaged area, put, for example, a “patch”.
• If you decide to just glue the edge of the wallpaper, then moisten the wallpaper and fold it back. Then apply a thin layer of glue to the wallpaper, press gently against the wall and smooth. Remove residual glue with a sponge.
• There are places where it is impossible to do with one gluing. For example, areas that have become darker or dirtier over time (although there is now a large selection of wallpapers that can be wiped clean). In such cases, the only solution is to put a “patch”, change the contaminated area. Here, just, you can use the pieces of wallpaper left after the repair:
  • To make a “patch”, you need to cut a square larger than the area that needs to be replaced.
  • Fit the cut-out square according to the pattern to the wallpaper.
  • Use the buttons to attach the square to the wall. Use a knife or razor to cut a piece from the attached square (while cutting a piece from the wallpaper on the wall) required for the restoration. Set aside the workpiece and use a damp sponge to remove the old section of wallpaper to be replaced.
  • Clean the wall and let it dry. Apply a thin layer of glue to the “patch” and carefully stick on the wall, smooth and remove the remaining glue.
• Another problem that is faced immediately after the renovation (perhaps, during the pasting of the wallpaper, not enough glue was applied) or after a leak from the neighbors on top is the “bubbles” on the wallpaper. In any case, the wallpaper needs to be “reanimated”, even for aesthetic reasons. The following steps are recommended:
  • Moisten the bubble with a clean, soft sponge.
  • Using a thin knife or razor blade, cut the bubble. Do not make a straight cut, but in the form of a V, this will make it easier to apply the adhesive to the wall. Using a narrow knife, spread the adhesive evenly under the wallpaper. You can use a syringe to inject glue under the wallpaper.
  • Press the wallpaper against the wall and smooth it carefully.

Curbs. Their purpose

Borders are stripes of wallpaper. Use them to create different effects when decorating your room. With the help of borders you can give the room decoration a special finished look, they allow you to visually increase or decrease the size of the room.

The use of borders is the best alternative to full wallpapering if you want to change the overall look of the room and do not want to bother with rearranging furniture and rubbish after a complete renovation of the room. Pasting the borders requires a little preparatory work. Borders can be combined with wallpaper by gluing them under the ceiling, near the floor, around windows and doors, dividing the room in two.

They have various shapes, sizes and patterns, and are self-adhesive. Often, borders are sold complete with wallpaper. If you buy borders separately, purchase them by matching them in color, pattern and texture in accordance with the wallpaper. You can also make the borders yourself by cutting them out of the wallpaper to the desired width.

On sale you can find different types of borders. Here are some of them:

For paper wallpapers.They are easy to stick on and easy to remove. The disadvantage is that they are short-lived, fade quickly, and cannot be cleaned with detergents. If you plan to frequently re-glue the wallpaper, then such borders are quite suitable.

For vinyl wallpaper.They are very practical, easy to wash, clean, do not fade or fade. Suitable for bathrooms, kitchens, hallways.

For textile wallpaper.These borders consist of two layers glued together: the bottom layer is thick paper, the top layer is woven material.

For acrylic wallpaper.These borders are similar to vinyl ones. They differ in that an acrylic emulsion is applied to the base and they are cheaper than vinyl borders.

Sticking borders

Borders, as mentioned above, can be glued in different places, it all depends on your taste and preferences, as well as on what you want to emphasize. A ceiling curb will not only reduce the size of an oversized room, but also draw attention to a beautifully designed ceiling. You can stick the borders at the bottom and top of the wall, highlight the area behind the armchair or sofa, making a frame of one or two border strips (you can even take different ones in pattern and color – the main thing is that they match). The process of gluing wallpaper borders is not difficult if you follow the following tips:

1. First, think carefully about where you are going to glue the border: under the ceiling or near the baseboard, in the middle of the wall or around a window or door.
2. Make sure the area you are going to glue is clean. Use a soapy solution to clean the surface. A clean surface is the key to quality work.
3. There should be no cracks, holes, voids or other defects on the surface of the wall where you will stick the border. Curbs are mostly made of tissue paper and any irregularities will show up sooner or later. Cover holes, scrape away paint or glue.
4. Apply glue to the prepared surface. There are self-adhesive borders available, but don’t expect them to hold well. For reliability, they are recommended to be lubricated with glue. When gluing the border, smooth it thoroughly, while removing excess glue.
5. When gluing curbs in corners, try to make sure the end of the curb grabs the adjacent wall. Glue the next strip with an overlap on the previous one, so there will be no gap in the corner.

Curbs around a door or window

Highlighting doors or windows with borders will create an effective decorative addition to the overall look of the room. The only difficulty is that the strips need to be accurately cut and connected in a mustache (connect at a 45 ° angle).

Please note that at the junctions of the two strips, at the corners, the stripes should overlap, overlapping each other. Try not to have large drawings, patterns or flowers in these places. Then, using a ruler or putty knife (lay it diagonally) with a sharp knife, make a cut through both strips.

Carefully remove the trim from the horizontal border. Peel back the edge of the same border and remove the trimmed edge of the vertical border. Bring the horizontal edge back into place, press and smooth the seam.

You can also stick the curbs on the ceiling and, as a mirror image, the curbs directly under the ceiling, which also affects the size of the room and its overall appearance.

Tips for choosing wallpaper and renovating a room

Wallpaper can not only decorate the walls in your apartment, but also give a special mood to the room and become a means for solving various design issues. Wallpaper, their color and pattern, can be manipulated, it is enough to successfully mask the imperfections of the room. Wallpaper is also used to decorate furniture. Perhaps some of the tips below will help you when renovating your apartment.

Choose the color of the wallpaper so that it matches the decor of the room and creates a single image of your apartment. It is recommended that the main (background) color of the wallpaper does not contrast too much with the color of the furniture (not necessarily with the whole!), Accent colors should be in harmony with the color of the cushions and bedspreads.

If one room passes into another, then, accordingly, it is necessary that the wallpaper is combined with each other. Correctly selected curbs will also help solve this problem..

Glue over lamp shades, flower pots, pieces of furniture, the back wall of the bookcase (shelves), children’s toy boxes, giving “individuality” and highlighting from the general background.

Left: The back of the cabinet is highlighted with wallpaper. Right: The headboards are glued “under the wall”

Dark tones, a large pattern will help to visually reduce too large a room; wide border under the ceiling combined with horizontal stripes on the wallpaper.

The table, walls and cupboards are covered with one border. Right: The border highlighted the door, ceiling, pieces of furniture

You can make a small room bigger if the color of the wallpaper is identical to the color of fabric products – curtains, bedspreads, rugs.

Matte wallpaper helps to hide the unevenness of the walls.

You can “revive” boring walls by pasting borders or wallpaper inserts with a “marble” or “wood” pattern, or by combining several patterns.

Don’t forget the nursery, of course. Pape the child’s room with neutral colors and decorate them with borders with some childish drawing: cars, bears, etc. (see photo below). If you wish, you can cut out cars, animal figures, clouds and stick them on the wallpaper. As the child grows up, the curbs can be changed.

Combine wallpaper and contrasting borders to create decorative wall panels and frames.

Connect your imagination, combine, look for new solutions, and your home will become cozy and special.