Paint over wallpaper or re-drywall?

[Mike]

We've got a small bathroom we're turning into a childrens' bathroom. It's currently has hideous wallpaper on it, my wife wants to paint a duck pond onto the wall.

Here's the problem .... the wallpaper is original to the house (24 years old), and it was applied directly to the drywall and backerboard, no priming, no nothing. Parts of the wallpaper are down, but there's a pretty solid glue coat underneath and I'm afraid we'll end up taking the drywall paper off if we try to scrape that down, and even if we don't it's going to take us forever and a day to get the job done.

The bathroom has a bathtub and tile enclosure, a vanity and a toilet. Is it feasible to work around those obstacles and install new drywall or greenboard without disturbing the existing fixtures? I know the substrate behind the tile probably isn't adequate and I should probably tear the tile out and start over, but that's more of a project than I'm willing to tackle right now.

[NickySantoro]

Is the drywall itself damaged where the paper is down or are you just seeing thick paste?

[Sev]

If you can work around fixtures, fine. Cover them with plastic/ dropcloth. Spackle as needed. Prime with oil based primer such as Kilz 1, 2 coats if necessary- VENTILATE well, stuff is not good to breathe. Paint with mildew resistant topcoats

[avid_hiker]

I am no expert here..but if it were me I would take as much wall paper off as possible , sand that down, a l;ight coat of plaster over that, then re-paint. Dunno if this is a solution, if not I am sure an expert here will say so. Good luck on your project..sounds like it will turn out nice when completed.

Dean

[Rick]

Maybe a bridging liner...

[HeyBub]

A DUCK POND?

Even if your children are of the age where a "Duck Pond" is cute, they won't be in an amazingly short time.

That means the Duck Pond motif will have to yield to something else - I sure wouldn't want my school chums to see ducks in my bathroom - I'd run away from home.

That being the case, and secure in the knowledge that you'll have to replace the whole enchilada in a few years anyway (maybe sooner if your kids are currently teenagers), paint the existing wallpaper.

[scott21230]

I've removed all the wallpaper in my house. It was not particularly difficult once I developed a system. Probably helped that I had plaster and not drywall, so I didn't damage my walls much..

[marks542004]

I would try steaming it .

You can test a small patch with a steam iron , if that works well, you can rent a steamer to do the rest of it .

The steam shouldnt do any damage to the drywall, but you can leave it dry for a day or two if you want before priming.

[gotcode]

I had the same problem, but a little worse. The people before me had papered, then pulled off the paper, left the glue and painted. Then papered again. So I got the top level paper off, and was looking at painted glue. After putting in a full day of meticulously removing the painted glue without destroying the drywall I gave up. I hired someone to come out and skip-trowel the whole room. I think it cost maybe 175$ for the 10x10 room. Best money I ever spent.

[Norminn]

Wallpaper comes off easily, once the paste is softened. Getting water to the paste is the tricky part. I certainly would not try to put new wallboard around bath fixtures. I have used extra coarse sandpaper to cut just the surface of wallpaper when it won't peel off. If the surface peels off, just spray the underlying paper well, let it soak and start scraping GENTLY. If the surface doesn't peel off, use the sandpaper to score it horizontally. Spray, soak, spray, soak, scrape. Washing off the remaining paste is the only hard part of this chore. I've never used steamers or chemicals - wallpaper paste just needs water.

[Mike]

Thanks for the fabulous design advice, HeyBub, but if my wife wants to make a duck pond of our infant son's bathroom, she can dang well make a duck pond of our infant son's bathroom. She and I are well aware it's not likely to be a lasting design and are well aware that we'll be repainting it in a few years, which is one reason why we'd like to have a lasting substrate.

Might we possibly stay on topic here and offer advice that's actually useful to my home REPAIR project?

HeyBub wrote:

[kellyj00]

I've pulled off two layers of wallpaper in my house...the top one had been painted over and looked horrible. Disgusting how some folks paint on wallpaper just to be lazy (I say this because I removed the paper easily)

Here's how I did it. Get an empty spray bottle (I used an empty bottle of febreeze) and fill it with about 1/3 white vinigar and the rest water. Now, spray the wall...heavily...wait ten minutes, then scrape with a decent 2.5" or 3" metal scraper. Try it in one spot, then you can thank me later...it does amazing work on paper-type wall paper. It wouldn't work too well on anything like foil type as the water can't penetrate the surface.

Ya, it makes a mess on the floor by the way... cover it. If you don't have carpet then you could *potentially* scrape up all the bits you're done.

The whole process for a 20x15 foot living room took about six hours, and my fingers were tired from spraying all the time. It's best if you've got two people...one to spray, one to scrape. and you can trade every now and again.

[Mike]

Nicky, it's hard to tell because it's such a mess, but it looks as if we're down only to a thick coat of glue with some patches of drywall showing through.

Remember, I've got two issues here. One is providing a good substrate for future painting. The other is time and money, one of which I'm going to have to spend to get this done. I might be able to get that glue off, but it's going to be a meticulous and use up a trememdous amount of time I could better use on other projects. If I'm going to complete the stripping, I'm going to have to hire the work out.

[Goedjn]

Just paint over the wallpaper. The fundemental perversity of the universe will then cause all the wallpaper to fall off, which solves your problem. If it doesn't, well, that solves your problem too.

[Goedjn]

Not unless you're willing to start paying us, no.

Get over it.

[jah213]

Personally, I would never paint over wallpaper if I had any other option. I've lived in quite a few houses where that was done, and it always ends up looking bad sooner or later (sooner, usually) and creates more problems down the line (either keep painting over it until you have a thick cardboard effect, very attractive [not], or finally decide to strip it off and then have to deal with painted wallpaper...awful). And, by the way, I think a duck pond idea for a kid's BR is cute. I have an adult friend who has done hers in a rubber ducky theme, and she has a lot of fun working with it.

Jo Ann

Mike wrote:

[BETA-32]

In the past, I used a 2 gallon pump sprayer (usually used for spraying insecticide) and bought a product called DIF at Home Depot. Using warm water and the DIF in the sprayer, I was able to soften the paste and it came off fairly easily. But I have read that different wallpaper applications have different types of paste -- some is easily softened with DIF and some is not. But the stuff is cheap so I would buy a bottle and test it. It works best when the wallpaper and the glue/paste come off together.

[jolt]

Listen to this advise I've removed more than my share of wall paper. It's really straight forward if you get a good sprayer, garden sprayers are IMO the best. Use hot tap water and soak the paper several times when required until the wheat paste beneth the paper becomes wet. Once the paste is wet the paper will start to pull off in complete sheets. If the paste is soft you don't have much need for a scraper.

Let the first coat soak in for awhile and spray a second time before trying to remove. Put drops or something down to catch the excess water and have sponges handy to dry the baseboards. The remaining paste is washed off with a wet sponge, then set a fan to dry the walls.

[krw]

You don't understand how perverse the universe really is. Only enough of the wallpaper will come of at a time to make it look hideous, forever.

OTOH, I ripped the paper off my bathroom walls (similar situation as the OP) and it's still not the same. I can't get paint to stick on the walls. It would have been far easier to gut the whole room and put up new sheetrock. Anyone who wallpapers unpainted sheetrock should be executed in the most painful way imaginable!

-- Keith

[krw]

Have you ever removed wallpaper that's been put up over bare, unpainted, sheetrock? You haven't a clue!