I have a house built in the early 1920's. Every wall in every room was
wallpapered with the paper applied over the bare plaster, multiple
layers no less. No paint, no primer just plaster. It was a major pain
to get all the paper off those walls, lots of scrapes and gouges left
behind to patch when done. Was this a common practice back then?

On Sep 25, 3:50*pm, K. G. Ulicni wrote:
I have a house built in the early 1920's. Every wall in every room was
wallpapered with the paper applied over the bare plaster, multiple
layers no less. No paint, no primer just plaster. It was a major pain
to get all the paper off those walls, lots of scrapes and gouges left
behind to patch when done. Was this a common practice back then?

Do you think it would have been easier to remove the paper if the
walls had been primed/painted?

I've removed paper from both painted drywall and painted and non-
painted plaster. I've scraped and gouged every wall to some extent.

"K. G. Ulicni" wrote in message
...

I have a house built in the early 1920's. Every wall in every room was
wallpapered with the paper applied over the bare plaster, multiple
layers no less. No paint, no primer just plaster. It was a major pain
to get all the paper off those walls, lots of scrapes and gouges left
behind to patch when done. Was this a common practice back then?

Yes this was normal. Interior walls were either paneled in
wood or plastered (on lath). The practical point is that, if to
be papered, a plaster wall did not need to be visibly perfect.
That could be done, but would take extra costly time and skill,
wasted when wallpaper was the standard interior treatment.

--
Don Phillipson
Carlsbad Springs
(Ottawa, Canada)

"K. G. Ulicni" wrote in message
...
I have a house built in the early 1920's. Every wall in every room was
wallpapered with the paper applied over the bare plaster, multiple
layers no less. No paint, no primer just plaster. It was a major pain
to get all the paper off those walls, lots of scrapes and gouges left
behind to patch when done. Was this a common practice back then?

My grandfather was a building inspector back then and he says they did that
mainly in places that were going to be used as whore houses....

On Thu, 25 Sep 2008 16:17:19 -0400, "Reggie Dunlop" slap@shot wrote:

"K. G. Ulicni" wrote in message
.. .
I have a house built in the early 1920's. Every wall in every room was
wallpapered with the paper applied over the bare plaster, multiple
layers no less. No paint, no primer just plaster. It was a major pain
to get all the paper off those walls, lots of scrapes and gouges left
behind to patch when done. Was this a common practice back then?

My grandfather was a building inspector back then and he says they did that
mainly in places that were going to be used as whore houses....


That explains the stains.

"K. G. Ulicni" wrote in message
...
I have a house built in the early 1920's. Every wall in every room was
wallpapered with the paper applied over the bare plaster, multiple
layers no less. No paint, no primer just plaster. It was a major pain
to get all the paper off those walls, lots of scrapes and gouges left
behind to patch when done. Was this a common practice back then?

Based on personal experiences, very common.

The good news is once you patch you gouges and any cracks you will have a
virgin, cured installation that you can properly seal and paint with no lead
based paint worries.

BTW, drywall mud is excellent for the patching and does not require the 30
day cure time before painting.

Colbyt

"K. G. Ulicni" wrote in message
...
I have a house built in the early 1920's. Every wall in every room was
wallpapered with the paper applied over the bare plaster, multiple
layers no less. No paint, no primer just plaster. It was a major pain
to get all the paper off those walls, lots of scrapes and gouges left
behind to patch when done. Was this a common practice back then?

Yes, of course, but all you have to do is spray the paper with water, wait
1-2 minutes, then scrape it off with no gouging. Why is this so difficult
for people to do? My house is nearly 200 years old and it only takes (took)
about 8 hours to scrape each room down to the bare plaster. And that was
only because the previous owners (morons) allowed multiple layers of paper
to build up. We stripped off all the old and put up new wallpaper in each
room. And no, we didn't treat the walls. We used the strippable stuff, so
the few rooms we've wanted to re-decorate since then had the wallpaper
removed in about 20 minutes.

"h" wrote in message
...

"K. G. Ulicni" wrote in message
...
I have a house built in the early 1920's. Every wall in every room was
wallpapered with the paper applied over the bare plaster, multiple
layers no less. No paint, no primer just plaster. It was a major pain
to get all the paper off those walls, lots of scrapes and gouges left
behind to patch when done. Was this a common practice back then?

Yes, of course, but all you have to do is spray the paper with water, wait
1-2 minutes, then scrape it off with no gouging. Why is this so difficult
for people to do? My house is nearly 200 years old and it only takes
(took) about 8 hours to scrape each room down to the bare plaster. And
that was only because the previous owners (morons) allowed multiple layers
of paper to build up. We stripped off all the old and put up new wallpaper
in each room. And no, we didn't treat the walls. We used the strippable
stuff, so the few rooms we've wanted to re-decorate since then had the
wallpaper removed in about 20 minutes.

I found, by accident, that drywall mud spread over wallpaper softens it up
pretty good overnight.

DerbyDad03 wrote in news:475350cc-2dc9-4536-b166-
:

On Sep 25, 3:50*pm, K. G. Ulicni wrote:
I have a house built in the early 1920's. Every wall in every room was
wallpapered with the paper applied over the bare plaster, multiple
layers no less. No paint, no primer just plaster. It was a major pain
to get all the paper off those walls, lots of scrapes and gouges left
behind to patch when done. Was this a common practice back then?

Do you think it would have been easier to remove the paper if the
walls had been primed/painted?

I've removed paper from both painted drywall and painted and non-
painted plaster. I've scraped and gouged every wall to some extent.

Same here. Too many times. A few months ago I had some really welded on
wallpaer boarder. Extremely thick glue or whatever it was. After doing a
couple of rooms of only little pieces coming off at a time and wall
chewing, I looked into renting a steamer. Then I saw at the Borg that
Wagner made one for 50 bucks. I figured if it sucked I'll just return it.
It made life a LOT easier. I'm thinking about all the wallpaper I'd removed
in the past. Wish I had got one years ago.

"K. G. Ulicni" wrote in message
...
I have a house built in the early 1920's. Every wall in every room was
wallpapered with the paper applied over the bare plaster, multiple
layers no less. No paint, no primer just plaster. It was a major pain
to get all the paper off those walls, lots of scrapes and gouges left
behind to patch when done. Was this a common practice back then?

Sure, they didn't care that 90 years later you'd want to re-do the place.
Latex paint didn't exist either so it is good that there is no paint and
then more paper.

On Sep 25, 5:53*pm, "h" wrote:
"K. G. Ulicni" wrote in messagenews:ldqnd497jtj5lg2pja6u9sh4mfd8oas4ni@4ax .com...

I have a house built in the early 1920's. Every wall in every room was
wallpapered with the paper applied over the bare plaster, multiple
layers no less. No paint, no primer just plaster. It was a major pain
to get all the paper off those walls, lots of scrapes and gouges left
behind to patch when done. Was this a common practice back then?

Yes, of course, but all you have to do is spray the paper with water, wait
1-2 minutes, then scrape it off with no gouging. Why is this so difficult
for people to do? My house is nearly 200 years old and it only takes (took)
about 8 hours to scrape each room down to the bare plaster. And that was
only because the previous owners (morons) allowed multiple layers of paper
to build up. We stripped off all the old and put up new wallpaper in each
room. And no, we didn't treat the walls. We used the strippable stuff, so
the few rooms we've wanted to re-decorate since then had the wallpaper
removed in about 20 minutes.

You got lucky.

The typical old house wallpaper that I see in my 90 year old houses is
a layer of 25 year old vinyl wallpaper, with a coat or two of paint
over it, and 2-3 layers of older wall paper underneath. I have tried
DIF, the Paper Tiger, special stripping tools, and even a steamer.
Still takes hours and hours, and you have to get ALL of the old paste
off before paint will stick.

JK

On Thu 25 Sep 2008 10:14:18p, Big_Jake told us...

On Sep 25, 5:53*pm, "h" wrote:
"K. G. Ulicni" wrote in
messagenews:ldqnd497jtj5lg2
...

I have a house built in the early 1920's. Every wall in every room was
wallpapered with the paper applied over the bare plaster, multiple
layers no less. No paint, no primer just plaster. It was a major pain
to get all the paper off those walls, lots of scrapes and gouges left
behind to patch when done. Was this a common practice back then?

Yes, of course, but all you have to do is spray the paper with water,
wai
t
1-2 minutes, then scrape it off with no gouging. Why is this so
difficult
for people to do? My house is nearly 200 years old and it only takes
(too
k)
about 8 hours to scrape each room down to the bare plaster. And that was
only because the previous owners (morons) allowed multiple layers of
pape
r
to build up. We stripped off all the old and put up new wallpaper in
each
room. And no, we didn't treat the walls. We used the strippable stuff,
so
the few rooms we've wanted to re-decorate since then had the wallpaper
removed in about 20 minutes.

You got lucky.

The typical old house wallpaper that I see in my 90 year old houses is
a layer of 25 year old vinyl wallpaper, with a coat or two of paint
over it, and 2-3 layers of older wall paper underneath. I have tried
DIF, the Paper Tiger, special stripping tools, and even a steamer.
Still takes hours and hours, and you have to get ALL of the old paste
off before paint will stick.

JK


Personally, I prefer wallpaper, and most homes I've owned have had
wallpaper in every room. However, given the situation you found yourself
in, I would certainly remove everything down to the plaster, then seal and
size the plaster, install lining paper, size the lining paper, then install
the final paper. This would not only give me the result I prefer, but also
make it infinitely easier to repaper when desired.

--
Wayne Boatwright

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