CREATING CUSTOM WALLPAPER

Michael Holigan: Wallpaper's a great way to add drama to any room in the house. But beautiful custom wallpaper can be pretty expensive, and what if you can't find the right color combination? Well, Stacy Robinson is going to show us a unique way to create custom wallpaper without that big custom price.

Stacy Robinson: Okay, this is a sample that I've made up and the client has approved. So we're going to get it real close to this.

MH: Okay Stacy, what do we do?

SR: Okay, we're going to take this butcher paper and we're going to wrinkle it up. I usually like to do it lengthwise. So, take the end.

MH: Looks crinkled. Gold and silver spray paint add subtle highlights to our wrinkled paper.

SR: We're going to lightly spray a random application. You can go on top with the silver.

MH: Once that's dried it's time to apply our undertone. How do we put the black on now?

SR: We're going to dry brush it on. What I mean by dry brushing is we don't want a lot of paint on the brush. We're going to lightly brush over the paper and hitting some of the wrinkles. Don't want a lot of this black. We're going to add some other colors in here. This is raw sienna and burnt sienna. Same idea.

MH: Is this latex?

SR: These are actually artist acrylics. Again, you want your brush to be dry, not a lot of paint and you're going to hit it the same way, just kind of filling in the areas. You can overlap. These colors will peek through the glazes.

MH: Once the undertones have dried we're ready to apply an ivory color wash that makes up our main color.

SR: We'll lightly go over. Now you can see where it's starting to look like the paper. We need to get a little more coverage. This time you want to cover up a lot of this area that we just painted because it's thin and it will show through. If you get too heavy in one area, let it dry, crinkle it up again and then start painting these first colors we put on.

MH: Just go back over it?

SR: Go back over it. Start the process again.

MH: I'm anxious to see it up on the wall.

SR: What we want to do is to start getting these into manageable sizes.

MH: What's manageable?

SR: Like, that's a good size. Just tear them into interesting shapes.

MH: While I continue to create interesting shapes Stacy cuts straightedge pieces. We'll use these around windows and door frames and wherever the wall meets the ceiling. Once we have all of our pieces, we move inside to the wet bar we're going to paper. What is this?

SR: This is heavy-duty clear wallpaper adhesive. We paint it on. It's messy.

MH: You just put it on very heavy.

SR: Heavy. I usually do two at a time. You want to let that set for just a minute.

MH: Does that take the crinkles out of our paper when it gets moist?

SR: It does. Straightens it out. You do want this to go on smooth. This paper is thick and so it needs to be precut. That's why we cut all the edges ahead of time. Let's smooth this and we're ready for the next piece. We're going to overlap.

MH: With all these colors you don't have to be real clean do you?

SR: With these random shapes I think anybody can probably wallpaper. It's easier than the real thing.

MH: I like it already.

SR: I like having a lovely assistant.

MH: No problem.

SR: You come back after lunch right?

MH: You keep checking on everything, make sure I did it.

SR: You might lighten up just a little bit. Lighten up, will you?

MH: Didn't have enough on there. Now, lighten up a little bit?

SR: Look at that. If you're going to do a job, do a job well.

MH: Four hours later it is indeed a job well done. Our handmade wallpaper transformed a small drab wet bar into a space with a lot of personality. And best of all, it was inexpensive and easy to do.

Episode 49 1997 - 98 Season

| Create Custom Wallpaper | Foam Insulation | Air Infiltration | Do-It-Yourself Sidewalk | Bad Credit |

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