I'd like to cover the walls in a room with pages of different newspapers. Does anyone have any ideas about this? Any experiences?
I'm wondering if it is possible, and if i should treat it like normal wallpaper, concerning the use of glue etc.
Maybe cover it with some kind of "see through" paint afterwards?
Any help is appreciated!
Warning, newspapers are not printed on durable paper. They are made of groundwood pulp which does not have a long life. Most office papers are made of digested wood chips using a different process and can even contain cotton fibres giving them a life of 50 to 100 years.
Newsprint, which is the paper used for newspapers will deteriorate in short order, especially in the sun. I have seen a newspaper sit on my driveway for
2 hours in the summer sun and turn yellow on the side facing the sun. Exposure to any light will start the process and end up with the paper turning a dark yellow.
I would use a modestly priced strippable wallpaper as a base. The removal of newspaper from a wall could turn into a disaster.
Bill
Hi,
One decorated a toilet room in this manner using funny & bizarre newspaper headlines &cuttings, used normal wallpaper paste then satin finish clear PU varnish after it had all dried .
It looked cool !.
I've installed old stock certificates that looked kind of cool. Maps are neat too. Will the ink on newsprint run when wet?
Walls will need to be solid color, any pencil marks etc. will bleed through.
Be sure to then prime walls with either Draw-tite or Gardz. Sherwin williams has thier own version also. I'ts known as a drywall repair clear. Works like a water based shellac will seal the wall well & facilitate removal later. Use cellulose adhesive, the stuff in a box that you'll mix with water. Load up the glue, lumps of it will disappear after it's dry. Newspaper will tear very easily when wet.
If you varnish it you'll be very sorry if you ever want to remove it. And trust me you will. You'll like it for now, but tire of it sooner than you think..
You could copy the newspaper into large sheets of high quality paper, vellum or even mylar sheets.
Not to press the point but sheets of newsprint paper are made from wood pulp that has been bleached by an acidic or caustic process. It therefore is not very long before any newspaper is old news and discolours badly. Not a good item to use, except as short term novelty. The oldest newspaper I've seen that was in good condition was dated 1926; it had been used as padding in the back of an old picture frame and therefore not exposed to light, but even it had gone a sort of pink colour. The front page headline of that paper was "More Trouble in Palestine". That, in 1926, was 22 years before the formation of the State of Israel in 1948! Hmm? Sort of history repeating! Deja-vu all over again.
Just paste the newspapers up on the wall like wallpaper and then seal them in by coating the whole wall with polyurethane. I did that once in the semi-slum walkup apartment I lived in briefly as a youth and it lasted at least three years, (after which I moved).
If the OP has not been put off his quest, he might consider having the newspaper pages photocopied onto good quality durable paper and pasting those to his wall. Or even have the pages photographed and glue them as large photographic prints. Maybe fix a protective UV film to the windows of the room and draw the drapes to minimise destructive sunlight when the room is not in use.
But I do recall a chemical method to preserve newspaper and prevent (or at least retard) its gradual yellowing. I don't recall the details, but I do believe the recipe involved soaking it in Milk of Magnesia plus maybe other ingredients. I reckon a web search might turn up something useful.
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