First, let me just tell you that when it comes to this house my parents crack me up on what they want to get done. My dad said "leave this wall alone and it'll be fine" but my mom said "sure go ahead and tear down that wallpaper." That was enough for me! Literally the moment I hung up with my mom I went straight over to the wall and grabbed a piece of wallpaper and ripped it off. There was no going back then.
When my parents bought this house years ago it had wallpaper everywhere. My parents eventually took it all down except for this one wall in the entryway. Don't know why they didn't finish this wall. Maybe they were just tired of ripping and tearing and painting.
Here's a look at the before. Old grandma wallpaper and brass chandelier that works but all the bulbs are burned out on.
When I said I grabbed a huge piece of wallpaper I meant it. This is where I started. I figured I could grab an edge of the wallpaper under the light switch. So that's what I did. Within 20 minutes this was the mess I had created.
I started out using the tried and true method of using fabric softener mixed with water in a spray bottle. It worked but it was just sooooo slow. We ended up using a steamer to get the rest of the wallpaper off.
These walls were weird. Up high over the arch there is texture. The wall on the left of the window had a little texture and the wall on the right had no texture. I had to make it all even and look like this was always supposed to look this way. I bought a can of the knockdown texture and started spraying.
I hadn't ever done texture before so I was a little nervous. But you can't really mess up texture so it's easy to figure out and get a system down.
Once all the texture was dry I started painting these walls to match the rest of the living room walls. While I was in paint mode I went ahead and painted the trim around the door and windows and baseboards.
Oh and I painted the front door too!
This whole thing took about 2 weeks to complete. It took longer than I had hoped but that happens when you're interrupted by kids 500 times.
A look at the before:
And after:
You can see Matt took down the old dust catcher chandelier and put up a recessed light. The living room has recessed lights so now it all matches.
Outside before:
Outside after:
We replaced the door knob, knocker, and kick plate. Doesn't this look so much better?!? The fun summer doormat is from Hobby Lobby.
The paint color is Chelsea Gray from Benjamin Moore.
Tip: If don't need a full gallon of paint go to Sherwin Williams and get a sample size of paint. It's cheap (like $5) and you get a good amount of paint in Satin finish. I painted the door with one sample can of paint in Chelsea Gray. You can also use Sherwin Williams coupons for their sample sizes too. There is usually a 30% off coupon on their website.
I'm almost finished with the boys room update so I'll be back next week with that reveal.
