I wish I'd kept track of how many hours I spent doing this. Or maybe not - that would be a bit depressing. Let's just say I spent MY ENTIRE SPRING BREAK (with the exception of the day I painted the bathroom vanity - another disaster I'll tell you about later) doing this.
These were my tools.
The top layer came off pretty easily with a scraper and using my hands to pull it down. When I pulled it out from behind the radiator, I found out that it was painted. See? The top left corner is the original, the rest was painted white.
We removed the huge mirror from above the fireplace...remember it?
We discovered this underneath.
So I knew I was in for at least 2 layers of peeling wallpaper. Ug. Once I pulled down the top layer, it also pulled off a bit of the blue layer underneath. The walls looked like this.
It left the adhesive backing stuck to the wall, which was impossible to pull off. Hm. There is a chemical you can use to help remove it, but I rejected that because I'm going all green and hippie. I heard you can use a steamer to help remove it, but before I went to Lowe's to rent one I turned to the Internet. I found a blog (that I can't find anywhere now!) that suggested using a spray bottle filled with water, thoroughly wetting the walls and then using a scraper to get it off.
Holy cow it worked. Not easily, but it worked. To make a long story short, I spent hour after hour after hour (you get it) scraping it off. I was left with this.
Whew. The walls are in great shape underneath (I was worried about pulling pieces of them off), but they are looking pretty dirty now. I'm hoping that my job is done and the painter will take care of the rest :)
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