DH wants to paint over wallpaper

[PollyOrange]

He's wrong isn't he? I don't mean wallpaper like textured paper either. I mean patterned AND textured. It'll look crap won't it? He reckons walls shot at under it. I cannot see it working. I may just strip it when he's out ...

It’s worth a try, even if to just prove him wrong. Just paint a strip so he can see. If you pull it off and half the plaster comes off with it, it will look a lot worse than painted wallpaper!

I've done it before, so it was just like a lining paper, it was fine. X

Its possible but tricky

1. Clean and patch any imperfections on the wallpaper.
2. Prime the wallpaper with a suitable primer.
3. Choose high-quality paint designed for wallpaper.
4. Test a small area before painting the entire wall.
5. Apply multiple thin coats of paint evenly.
6. Inspect for imperfections and touch up as needed.
7. Consider adding a clear sealer for extra protection.

We did it in the spare bedroom, was absolutely fine.

If you really can’t bear the texture, you could put lining paper over it and then paint.

If it is elderly paper, it was probably put on to ‘ hide imperfections’ , that is, cracks and bad patches, and if you take it off, you will have to make good before you paint. Plus whatever glue used to be used for that sort of paper sets like a rock, it is the devil to get off….

Team DH here , but why not paint a wall and see how it comes out? ( p.s I’ve often painted over this sort of paper and two coats of emulsion worked just fine).

We did this and it looks good - acted as lining paper - but agree it depends on the texture. Definitely try it at least

So have I ,many times.

I've just taken off textured patterned wallpaper that had been up since 1970! A large chunk of plaster came off with it and I had to buy a steamer to unglue it, probably should have got it re skimmed but I'm on a tight schedule so just used rather a lot of filler, messy and time consuming.
It will be fine to paint over but to will have to prime it if its vinyl. It can look OK if the raised pattern is just a small texture, not so good if it's large swirls etc in my opinion.

Won't that make it really hard to strip the paper later on?

@PollyOrange

is he generally good at DIY/decorating or a bit crap/workshy?

If he has said the plaster has blown underneath & he's likely not making that up then painting over it is a good/cheap 'brighten up'. If you're planning on staying & have the money (to get the room plastered) then go ahead & strip the paper if you're prepared to do the job of removing all the crap plaster and paying to have it plastered.

personally I can't abide just painting over the top of crap.

people saying they've done it before & it was fine means nothing, their walks are not your walks.

Buy him a copy of the Secret Diary of Adrian Mole aged 13 and 3/4 and get him to read the chapter where Adrian decides to paint his bedroom walls black, then ends up having to colour in every one of Noddy’s hat bells with a black marker 😂.

@Heather37231 🤣🤣

If you're really lucky you might have a vinyl paper where you can carefully peel the top vinyl layer off, leaving a plain paper layer that acts like lining paper.

To everyone else thank you. Really interesting. It's a flowered pattern but not very current. If it was flat paper I'd do it in a heartbeat.
Also the rest of the room is painted not papered which I should perhaps have said. Those walls are fine so no reason to believe this "feature" wall won't be either. But yes I'd be annoyed if I paint over and it looks crap. Sigh. I wish I had a crystal ball to look into the future after stripping it !

I painted over awful looking wallpaper moving in- never had a problem. That's 40 years ago now.

Of course depends if the walls are solid or an old house. Mine was a new build.

I’d be so pissed off if you did that
how do you plan to make good the walls before

if you do decide to strip it have a plan how you are going to sort it

don’t make a massive problem then expect him to sort it

Realistically you might be left with a world of pain if you strip it. Youre probably going to either have it filled and sanded then lining paper at the least, or better still, pay for it to be skimmed. Lining paper can hide a lot of problems and bind slightly dodgy surfaces together, I’ve got away with that in the past, but don’t underestimate the time that’ll take.

If you’re going down the paint over it route, I’d slap some budget primer/undercoat on it before emulsion. Something like Leyland acrylic, have been using that successfully to cover over lots of things recently- it’s cheap and does the job.

Wallpaper used to be textured in the old days (thinks woodchuck- aaaarrrrggggh).

Definitely worth a go, and if it looks crap, you are no worse off other than the price of some paint.

@rwalker are you my husband ?
We're now contemplating keeping the paper and repairing if it doesn't look fresh again once the other walls are painted
When we last painted it there was no treatment needed to the other walls so I've no reason to think this will be different

can you wallpaper ?

if you strip the wall 3 options are
fill and paint
1000 grade lining paper and paint
have the wall skimmed

lining paper and paint might be a good compromise

Wood chip even. Bloody speel chuck.

We've used lining paper and paint on very old walls bar the landing that was artexed that we had sealed and skimmed

I recommend Wallrock Fibreliner paper, really good finish.

Oooh we did this with a patterned textured paper, using a dark colour matt paint. It came out beautiful (and looked very expensive!) definitely worth a go.

I used zinser wallpaper cover paint, worked a treat, parts of ours was a dark brown too (came with the house!) 😊