I just removed wallpaper from three walls. It took days. The people who lived here before used one very thin coat of very cheap flat white paint on top of drywall. That is the only prep they did. Then they slapped up the paper. I finally got most of the paper down but my walls are in terrible shape. Several areas of drywall peeled away. And now there is the paste. I don't know what they used but it seems like crazy glue. I have tried chemical paper stripper and vinegar and water. Nothing works. If I steam it it melts enough to be scraped off some but that damages the walls even more. What can I do? I planned on painting a very light shade but I don't think the walls will be smooth enough. Any advice will be GREATLY appreciated. Thanks!
COMMUNITY FORUM
Welcome Lannie,
Years ago I ran into the same problem. I rented a steamer and this worked great on ALMOST all of it, except one hideous wall that had absolutely heinous floral wallpaper. The steamer turned this wall into a gooey, semi-floral mess.
What really worked GREAT for this was we found some 4x8' sheets of 'nice' paneling. You may say, 'nice paneling'--isn't that an oxymoron? Well, it really WAS decent looking--pre-finished with what looked like a subtly-striped wallpaper design. It was an easy fix; just covered it up. If it hadn't worked, I probably would have drywalled on top of what was there and started over; a considerably bigger job.
Hopefully you'll find something you like, or someone else may have an even better solution to rescue your current project...but it sure worked for us.
Good luck, and again, welcome!
You will need to remove all of the paste with the steamer before you do any painting or repair. After the paste is removed you will need to sand the walls to remove the loose face paper of the drywall and then prime them with GARDZ from Zinsser which will lock the face paper down. Then you will need to skim the walls with drywall mud to get them smooth. Before you paint you will need to prime the walls with a latex drywall primer and then apply the finsih paint of choice.
Hope this helps out.
Hope this helps out.
PS
If you have any other paper you don't like in this house the best way to get rid of it is to prime over it with an oil based primer and paint over it this way it be a part of the wall as you ahve found out it pretty much is already anyway.
