Residential Winners Commercial Winners Specialty Winners See All Entrants (PPT)

Members of the National Guild of Professional Paperhangers have recognized nine exceptional wallcovering installation projects with 2006 Winning Walls with Wallcoverings awards. The Zinsser Company, makers of wallcovering installation products, proudly sponsors the NGPP’s Winning Walls With Wallcoverings program.

The program is open to any NGPP member who has completed a wallcovering project during the calendar year. An independent panel of judges assesses each entry by assigning point scores to fifteen different project factors, including creativity, special challenges, materials, time constraints, and the quality of the entry presentation. The awards were presented at a luncheon held during the 2006 National Guild of Professional Paperhangers Convention and Tradeshow in St. Louis, Missouri, September 20-23, 2006.
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First place award winners were Eunice and Frank Bokstrom, Design Wallcovering Professional Installation, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, in the Residential Category; Larry Duval, C.P., Larry Duval Wallcovering Services, Tampa, Florida, in the Commercial Category; and Donald Foreman, Menlo Park, California, in the Specialty Category.
Second place awards went to Elizabeth “Buffy” Groves, The Paperhanger, Heathsville, Virginia, in the Residential Category; Rusty Gauthier, Gauthier Wallcovering, Boerne, Texas, in the Specialty Category; and to Herb Potts, Wallcoverings & Coatings, Beecher, Illinois, in the Commercial Category.

Receiving honorable mention recognition were Mary Lang Farrell, Homeside Building Corporation, White Plains, New York, in the Residential Category; Michael Baughman, C.P., Baughman Wallcoverings, Oceanside, California, in the Commercial Category; and Scott Mulhern, O’Hern Works, Hopewell, New Jersey in the Specialty Category.

Residential
1st Place Winner
Eunice and Frank Bokstrom, Design Wallcovering Professional Installation, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada

2nd Place Winner
Elizabeth “Buffy” Groves, The Paperhanger, Heathsville, Virginia

Honorable Mention
Mary Lang Farrell, Homeside Building Corporation, White Plains, New York

Commercial
1st Place Winner
Larry Duval, C.P., Larry Duval Wallcovering Services, Tampa, Florida

2nd Place Winner
Herb Potts, Wallcoverings & Coatings, Beecher, Illinois

Honorable Mention
Michael Baughman, C.P., Baughman Wallcoverings, Oceanside, California

Specialty
1st Place Winner
Donald Foreman, Menlo Park, California

2nd Place Winner
DRusty Gauthier, Gauthier Wallcovering, Boerne, Texas

Honorable Mention
Scott Mulhern, O’Hern Works, Hopewell, New Jersey

Entry Descriptions

Residential First Place Award

This residential project took place in a large 11,000 square foot home with a spectacular riverfront setting.  A variety of textiles and fabrics were installed throughout the home with this entry concerning the guest bedroom which became a special focal point.

The architect had specified wallcovering for the headwall – a beautiful material from Maya Romanoff called ‘inlay Earth Fibers’ which is a diamond parquet grasscloth pre-made as rolled goods.

The first challenge came as a result of the geometry of the room: the main ceiling area in this room was set off by a three-level coffer. Unfortunately this created a narrow bulkhead over the door area and did not provide a clean ending point for the wallcovering.  Knowing the client had her heart set on the wallcovering, we suggested removing the bulkhead and re-drywalling the ceiling to continue the plane of the coffer in the door area.  This would keep the same reveal around the perimeter of the room and allow for proper placement of the wallcovering.

The second challenge arose when the one-yard sample ordered of the specified material for client approval was hung.  The seams were totally unacceptable due to edge damage and could not be re-trimmed without cutting into the design slightly and throwing the pattern off. Both the client and the designer were unhappy about compromising their vision for this room but saw no way around the problem of the unsightly seams other than choosing a different wallcovering, changing the entire look.  Having seen the ‘on point’ technique demonstrated at an NGPP convention years ago, the installers knew they could capture the original concept by doing a custom installation; cutting squares of plain grasscloth and placing them on the wall at a 45 degree angle, rotating each square 90˚ to attain the parquet effect. The advantages of this type of installation were explained.
 
The client and designer agreed to another test hang to demonstrate this method, so another sample of the same Maya Romanoff grasscloth, but plain, was ordered.  For the test hang of the custom method, 12” squares were used to demonstrate the look.  At the same time, the installers calculated the options for having 6, 7 or 8 full diamonds on the wall and sketched those sizes so the client and designer could choose.  They selected the largest of the three.

When complete, the wall was stunning; the play of light highlighted the texture and made it come alive.

This project was special because multiple challenges were overcome successfully and the end result was beautiful.  There was a lot of pressure to do the work as quickly as possible as the owners were anxious to move in – they had experienced repeated construction delays and commented favorably on the installers’ professionalism and how smoothly the installation work progressed compared to many other trades. The client is absolutely thrilled with her custom wallcovering job.

Commercial First Place Award

In the fall of 2005, Riha Design, a Chicago based design office with an office in
Naples, Florida contacted Mr. Duval to install a digital mural for the Siam Sales Center, an upscale condominium in Hollywood, Florida.  The successful installation of this mural was a key element in the builder's presentation; showing what it would be like living on the shores of the Atlantic Ocean.  Fun in the sun in your backyard, the Atlantic Ocean.

This unique mural was created and digitally printed by the Riha Design Group,
Inc.  The mural was printed on a polymer saturated reinforced non-woven paper product and laminated with a vinyl protective coating.  Each panel measured approximately 53 inches wide with sixteen (16) total panels, making it about 70 feet.  Each panel contained a variety of text or photos of beach scenery to inform and entice the prospective homeowner that this is where they need to live.  The mural was installed on one long wavy (curved) wall.  This wall with all its curves created their own set of challenges.

As installation of the mural progressed, each panel was brought to the wall and hung to the laser line.  Before double cutting, each overlapped panel was carefully examined several times to be certain that the vertical and horizontal matches were accurate. 

The complexity of this job was far beyond that of a regular mural installation.  The factor that made this project the most difficult was the match of each panel and the overall look of all the finished murals.  Concentration was paramount in achieving this important task!

Regular wallpaper can often be so busy that the eye does not notice seam alignments.  Your eye automatically focuses on the overall look rather than each sheet.  Since the elements in the murals were beach scenes, people, and written text, your eye is immediately drawn to the slightest mismatch.  Because of this, adjustments were made until the match was flawless.  This differed too from large murals hung on ceiling or high walls where the closest observation of them can often be from 10 to 25 feet away.  Murals such as that have the luxury of' requiring far less precision than this installation.

The superior craftsmanship yielded a beautiful installation that earned high praise from Riha Design Group and their client. 

Specialty First Place Award

The total project encompassed eight rooms in a newly remodeled 6,000 square foot ranch style house.  Just off of the long entry hall is the living room on the right and the dining room on the left, all of which had elevated ceilings with sloped walls that angled down from the ceiling to the crown moldings.  Each of these three rooms had a slightly different configuration; size of the ceiling, angle of the sloped side-walls and height of the sloped walls.  These combined to make the working access more problematic adding numerous ladder/scaffold moves.

The master bedroom walls were 8' on the north and south ends and rose to a 14' high peak in the middle of the east and west walls, requiring a bilaterally symmetrical installation with the 36" wide custom painted panels.

The family room bath also used custom canvas in 9' lengths by 36" wide and was installed over lining paper.  The kids bath canvas, 9" by 36",was also strategically placed to minimize the number of seams and. enhance the paneling effect of the pattern.

The powder, room paper was produced on 36" wide computer paper painted with a translucent deep red with an overlay of 3" gilded squares placed to allow for the red to show through.  The gilding was distressed for a more rustic/aged appearance.   The ceiling was installed to align with the grid of the gild on the walls.

The most challenging spaces were the 28' x 14' grand entry hall, the living room and the dining room.  Each of the ceilings was a different height.  The living room was 9', the dining room was 10', and the entry way was l4'.  The size and height of' the ceilings and the height and angle of the sloped walls required a unique approach to the installation.

Of particular concern was the way the 3" squares would line up at:

• the sloped walls in the corners, almost a miter situation.
• the apex of the sloped walls and the ceiling, and
• the registration at the crown moldings.

The installer wanted the same portion of a square to show on the east and west sides and the same portion of a square on the north and south sides.  It took two days to get all the chalk lines on the three ceilings and sloped walls and five more days to install the three areas. 

Once the ceilings were completed, sloped walls were installed.  Unlike working on a vertical wall, a sloped wall can be right in your face at the top and 3' away at your knees.  The "course corrections" made in the ceiling now affected the sloped walls requiring additional adjustments to be made to keep the squares true and on registration.

When completed over 225 linear yards of 24" wide paper-backed gilded-suede were installed. The paper for the walls was a custom colored parchment paper 15.5" by 17.5".  Two thirds of the papers in the entry way had no motif and the other third had a single randomly placed 2" by 2" gilded square.  The papers in the hall perpendicular to the entry were the same color but without motif and the papers in the living room were all fully gilded and distressed.  The installation method chosen by the designer was called a vertical shift.  It looks like a brick wall turned 90 degrees.  Generally the reveal at the top and bottom need to be consistent but you have to factor in other focal indicators such as how the pieces will look over the door casings or other obstacles.  Once this was all considered and the walls were marked for the 17.5" pieces, yellow chalk lines were snapped horizontally on the walls at 17" intervals. Since this was a vertical shift, the next column was offset vertically by 1/2 a piece and marks were made at 17" intervals for this column.  This secondary set of marks was chalk lined in blue.

The hall off the entry way was easier as all the pieces were void of gild.  The papers in the living room were a distressed gild but installed using the horizontal shift, more like a brick pattern.

At this point the project had successfully installed 295 linear yards of 24" gilded suede and 970 pieces of parchment.

This is definitely one of those incredible jobs.  When entering from the circular driveway and through the large double cherry doors, with the rainbow window overhead, the entry in its grandeur is evident.  From the 14' ceilings, the three chandeliers, mirrors, tables and exotic wood floors which blend with the parchment on the walls and the reflective qualities of the gilded paper on the ceiling, make for a very memorable space.

Residential Second Place Award

Finding contractors in a rural area who are willing to take on small jobs can be a real challenge.  The installer was called to do some work for customers who had recently moved to the area from San Francisco. They had purchased an old farm house and were in the process of doing some renovations. 

Their home was built in 1928. It has the standard floor-plan common to farmhouses in the area, e.g., large screened in front porch, enter into a front foyer, stairs going up to the second floor; small sitting room to the right, short hallway back to the kitchen, and dining room to the left.  The dining room also has a door that leads to the kitchen, and in this particular home, on the opposite side of the room, a double door opening that leads to another larger sitting area.

One of their projects was to remove the wallpaper from the dining room.  The room was dark and pretty dingy looking.  The paper turned out to be two layers over plaster walls.  While the paper on the walls came off without incident, the main problem area in this room was over the mantel. When they bought the home, there had been a large flower arrangement on the wall above it.   When they took possession of the house, they found that the plaster under this flower arrangement was seriously damaged from the ceiling line down eighteen inches or so and about two feet wide.  The only thing that seemed to be holding the plaster together was the paper itself. 

The installer first removed all of the loose plaster pieces and old joint compound until solid wall was reached.  Fortunately, the lath underneath was in good shape.  It was not rotted or wet, needing only a few replacement screws in a couple of studs. 

A drywall ceiling had been installed over the plaster ceiling with paper that had been painted over. Since the paper had been installed over bare drywall and was very well adhered, it was decided to seal this in.

The customers were extremely pleased with the outcome. They had originally planned to paint this room, but after seeing the result of this repair, and what had been done to the rest of the room, they changed their mind in favor of wallpaper.  They wanted a chair rail installed, with the paper to go above it. 

Since there is no such thing as a good corner in houses like this, the installer chose to use corner blocks instead of trying to cope the mitered cuts for the inside corners of the chair rail. After the chair rail was installed, the whole room from ceiling to baseboards received a coat of Zinsser's Bullseye 1-2-3.  The trim was painted white and the area below the chair rail was "Metro Gold" using Ace's "Royal Touch" paints.

When the paper arrived, it was only 20-1/2" wide with a 20-1/2" drop match.  By calculations, they would have just enough…no room for errors.  Upon opening the first roll, it was found to be defective in that it had ink track marks down the middle of the whole roll.  Fortunately, the other rolls were without defect so the job could begin.

This project took a total of 55 hours, spread over a 3-week period.  This was due to the drying time needed for the plaster and prep work and the delay while waiting for the replacement roll of wallpaper.  The clients were extremely patient.  They understood that a project like this takes time and care.

What started out as a wallpaper removal project, blossomed into an excellent learning opportunity.  The installer was also pleased that the work done prompted the customers to go with wallpaper instead of paint.  This endeavor truly was "winning walls" for the wallcovering industry.

Commercial Second Place Award

Imagine dealing with nearly three hundred and fifty curious and sometimes cranky 70, 80 and 90 year-olds with canes, walkers, and wheelchairs for nearly five months as you stripped five different types of wallcoverings, repaired and primed heavily damaged walls, and then installed over 4,500 yards of commercial wallcoverings in the common hallways of two busy retirement centers in northern Illinois (Naperville and Rockford).  In linear feet, the hallways in Rockford were equivalent to fifteen football fields and Naperville equaled nearly fourteen footballs fields!

After project assessment, removal began of the existing wallcoverings.  The existing paper did not remove easily.  It was discovered that the walls had not been prepped uniformly.  At least six types of previous prep materials had been used from flat latex paint to Benjamin Moore's wall prep product. This made removal very challenging. In addition, five years prior to this major redecorating project, college students were hired to repair loose edges and open seams with Stan-fix (i.e, Elmer's glue product), making it impossible to remove the backing of the wallpaper wherever they re-glued the paper.  Sixty-five percent of the pre-pasted papers were impossible to remove due to the previous wall prep methods.  Therefore, proper prep for wallpapering had to be done and installation took place over the existing paper.

Due to the previously inadequate wall prep, the wall damage was extensive, 65% to 75% total wall damage.  This extensive wall repair was necessary because the project called for the installation of a smooth, spun-backed wallcovering with a low sheen finish that would show the slightest wall texture or imperfection.

The 54" vinyl wallcovering that was hung above the chair rail was a vertical striped pattern with a 25" horizontal repeat.  The other pattern (random matched 54" vinyl wallcovering) was hung below the chair rail.  As work was done in narrow hallways (5' 6" wide) a constant opening had to be maintained so that the residents with their walkers and wheelchairs could pass by as they traveled to and from their rooms. 

At the Naperville site, the installation was going to be the same.  However, the preparation work was quite different.  This was the third time this location was being re-papered.  The previous two times no wall prep work was completed.  It was discovered that the second paper was actually hung over damaged walls caused by the first removal.  The first removal utilized a PaperTiger tool (a perforating tool) resulting in heavy score marks through the face of the drywall. Due to this past wall history, damage to the upper walls was 30% and damage to lower walls was 100% of the wall area.  All paper removed was Type I1 54" canvas backed vinyl hung with clay adhesive. 

Nine hundred and seventy-five man and woman hours were spent on this project between the two locations from start to finish.  The extensive wall preparation and attention to detail during the whole process provided a beautiful installation. 

Many accolades from the company owners, facility managers, residents and visiting family members were received.  The paperhangers were the only contractors on this large scale project with a "zero item" punch list.  All the other trades were repairing and replacing many items during this redecorating project.  Because the installers provided a commercial installation that was both cost effective and economical in the long run, they have already been contacted by another national chain to handle their work throughout the United States.

Specialty Second Place Award

This project was done on an exclusive private ranch estate in the Texas hill county.  The estate had been under construction for a few years already. It started with a call from an artist who studied extensively in Europe and now resides in San Antonio, Texas.

He told the installer that he had forty-eight canvas murals that he had put together and needed installed. Although he was a talented and well known artist he lacked the knowledge needed to do the extensive layout and cutting of his murals due to their unusual length, width and shape. The murals consisted of a variety of shapes and sites which included: arches, circles, crescents, rectangles, squares, and triangles with arches cut into them.  The sizes ranged from circles of 36" in diameter to crescents that were up to 15 yards in length. The artist asked the installer if he could layout, prep, and install these murals onto a ceiling that was twenty-five feet in height. 

The planning began at the jobsite where a scaffolding system was designed. The first scaffolding system was metal that was completely decked on top with a safety rail. This was necessary since the project would require consistently working over heads throughout the installation of the murals. The second scaffolding needed was an electric scissor lift. This system would be used to bring glue, water, primer, and any other tools needed to complete the scope of work. Due to the height of the ceiling safety was a major concern and the scissor lift would allow the crew to move materials safely.

The third scaffolding system was made of wood and was hand built on the job site and used to access the stairwell areas. The artist drew his shop drawing onto a piece of paper indicating were the murals were to be placed. Next, the layout process began.

The installers started by squaring the room off using a three foot, four foot, and five foot squaring system across the ceiling giving straight lines to work from. Then a chalk line to extend our lines across the room was used. At this point a layout of every mural in its place on the ceiling was done.

Next, a custom table was built to accommodate the unusual shapes and sizes of the murals. After the murals were cut, they were transported to the ceiling using the scissor lift to the scaffolding above. Then, the mural was unrolled and installed into the layout lines of the ceiling. Paperhangers call this process a dry hung installation. The murals were brushed out with a long bristle brush, but it left bubbles. The installer switched to a plastic sweep to remove the remaining bubbles, being extremely careful not to scratch the murals.  The canvas came in 48" widths, but some of the murals were 54" in width, so an additional 3" strip was installed on each side of the mural by overlapping and double cutting giving the required width needed.

Shadowing from one side of the circles perimeter to the other was apparent. The artist created this to give a shadow effect on the mural, and so this had to be taken into consideration when installing the mural in conjunction with the home's windows in order to give a realistic appearance of a true shadow. If the entire ceiling were folded over itself it would create a mirror image. This art work is known as a grottesca ornamental work that is mainly seen in Italy.

Once the installation was completed, the murals were trimmed out in gold leafed to match the room's crown molding. Due to the vast expanse of the room it was impossible to get a single picture of the entire room. The entire project took three weeks from start to finish.  The installer had never come across a project of such magnitude and extensive detail to planning of layout of so many different shapes and sizes which had to be installed over head as opposed to a regular wall installation. This job challenged and excited the installer daily in all aspects from planning, prepping, layout and installation. Everyday brought new challenges and inspired creative drive to succeed in providing the client with perfection and satisfaction.

Honorable Mention Residential Award

In late November of 2005, the installer was offered the opportunity to bid on a wallpapering project involving dark red grass cloth. It began in the typical way many December projects begin; an inquiry from a decorator who wondered if the installer would have any time before Christmas to do a bedroom in a home in Rye, New York.

"Sure" was the answer.

The decorator asked for an estimate the quantity of material, cost and time required to hang dark, pomegranate red Gramercy grass cloth in the attic room of a 9,000 square foot mansion. One immediate degree of difficulty would be three flights of stairs. And, dark red anything makes most paperhangers a little nervous.

The room was rectangular 20 feet by 24 feet. It had two 8 foot long gables cutting into two of the sides of this space. Small 6 over 6 double hung windows allowed shafts of light into the room.

The perimeter of this attic room had typical 3 foot high knee walls. The most outstanding feature of the room was the ceiling which followed the 40% pitch of the roof line from three feet low to nine feet high. Traditionally the walls in an attic room come together at right angles in the corners.  They usually meet in a square or rectangle in the ceiling directly overhead. This was not the case. The comers of the rafter ceiling walls had been rounded and they met the ceiling in an oval shape. Ordinarily when compensating for the space where the rounded gabbled ceiling comes down to meet the knee wall would be a flat triangle. This also was not the case. Here they met the corner walls in a rounded dart shape resembling the top of a valentine. It was a perfect example of the genius of a master plasterer. No corners only curves. An oval dome atop a rectangle.

This was not your average bedroom. This was a challenge. But this was going to be fun…a Christmas gift. It would take 24 bolts of paper, tinting the edges, tinting the primer, extra time up and down stairs, double cutting, doing  extra math, lots of planning and imagination.

The decorator was enthusiastic and cooperative with all the options presented in planning the installation. Rather than hang the grass cloth in a traditional horizontal method we explored other options that would enhance the lines of the room. Grass cloth can be hung horizontally, and vertically, on the diagonal or scribed in any atypical line to fit any irregular shapes. Grass cloth also offered a unique opportunity to showcase the structure of the room. The installer pointed out that the paper could be installed in long triangular shapes to fit the contour of the sloping ceiling. This might resemble the inside of an umbrella. The paper could come down the rounded comers of the sloped canopy shaped ceiling and meet the side walls at any angle. On the flat section of the ceiling the paper enhanced the recessed light fixture in long radiating triangles.

When panels of grass cloth are not hung perfectly horizonta1 to each other you can create an optical illusion…you think you see a wave in the wall. This is not good in a traditional project but pleasing in this case. It was possible to use this illusion to accentuate architectural details in the room. The versatility of grass cloth was employed over the dormer windows. Paper was applied horizontally and diagonally. This altering of the direction of the grass cloth accentuated the peeks in the peeks above the dormer windows.

The final finished look is romantic. The decorator is very happy and the homeowner is ecstatic. The room is serving as a getaway for the home owner who is the mother of five school age children.

Honorable Mention Commercial Award

Each of the two murals was printed on 54" wide Solvotex canvas. Each panel was four yards plus one inch long.  The finished size of each mural that was supplied to the printer was 171.25" wide by 144" high.  The on-site wall panel dimensions were: Youth Mural
Right – 171-1/8" wide by 144-1/8" high and the Wisdom Mural Left – 171-3/4" wide by
144-1/8" high, finished installation dimensions.  The printer had trimmed the murals to
one inch over size.  This created very tight tolerances for proper installation.  This meant the mural would need to be installed extremely accurately, with absolute attention to detail of placement, alignment and trimming, being done at all times during the installation process.

The two, four panel murals were unwrapped and opened out on the carpeted floor with plastic under them, to keep the back of the murals clean.  The mural panels were matched to the proper set.  The client reviewed the murals and approved color and size after comparing to the proof that had been approved. Each set was labeled on site.  Final Youth was labeled A thru D and Final Wisdom was labeled #1 thru #4.  This avoided any confusion between each set of murals, since they were the same color tones. Each of the four panel murals was matched to the image and over lapped 1".  Then every 12 inches along the seam, a piece of' low tack 1/2-inch wide black artist tape was applied.  The tape was then cut along the edge of each mural panel.  The panels were then separated.  This gives the hanger exact check marks on each panel to match the mural when applying to the wall.

After the Youth mural was installed, the client did not like where the printer and graphic design people had the image end.  It was not quite the same as his sample.  The senior account manager for the printer was then called.  What the client wanted was explained to the printer.  It was followed up with an e-mail with the correct field measurements.  The client downloaded his copy of his desired graphics' to a flash card for the installer's computer.  The file was scanned and then down loaded to the computer.  The graphic file was then attached to the e-mail.  The amount of over lap between panels required and the amount of salvage required outside of the bleed area was added.  The printer's senior account manager called back to let us know that the murals would be reprinted and packaged for delivery, the next day. 

The next day the murals arrived.  First, it was important the client reviews the murals, and approves them.  The image was still not cropped the way he wanted.  It was later discovered the graphic designer in England did not properly crop the file for the printer and it had been printed within the file perimeters.  New murals were printed and the installer returned to the job site for installation.

Working with a graphic artist out of England, a printing company out of' your local area and a job site not in your state and getting every one on the same page can be a challenge.  It was found that airplanes and computers, as well as cell phones could also become critical equipment for a wallpaper installer.

Honorable Mention Specialty Award

The clients contacted the installer through a referral from Bradbury and Bradbury nearly three years ago.  They had seen an ad for Bradbury papers in Victorian Times magazine in the mid-nineties and set out to find land and build their own new Victorian with the express purpose of doing the whole place in these magical wall coverings they had fallen in love with.  Eight years later, their house complete in every imaginable custom detail, they were ready for wallpaper.  The husband owns a very large auto body shop and while not an artist he has an extraordinary sense of design and color. For example, the thirty eight pillars which surround the house were spayed with auto paint and baked just like a Mercedes.  He had all moldings milled to his designs and everything was stained and finished with colors he had personally mixed. Every possible detail was thought through a hundred times so that the house would be a perfect canvas on which to paint his Bradbury and Bradbury dream. 

At the first meeting with him the installer felt like he was the bull and the installer was the matador.  He asked countless questions about the installer’s work and experience. Testing, testing, testing.  All the right answers must have been given because he hired the installer to do the dining room.  It was done pretty much like the scheme in Bradbury’s samples and he was thrilled.  Six months later the parlor was done in a more creative way, including using the wrong paper which the company had sent for the walls.  We thought about sending it back until we all agreed that the wallpaper gods had intervened and we took their cue.  He and his wife were incredibly happy with the results. 

He called again about eighteen months later.  They were ready to do the family and breakfast rooms, the two story center hall, the rear stairs and upstairs hall; every wall, ceiling, outlet cover, vent, everything.  It had to be like nothing that had ever been done before and the installer was free to do whatever he wanted as long as he used the patterns they loved and could convince him that it would all be of a piece since every area flowed into every other area.  The basics were selected and it was decided that the walls, the large frieze pattern and the baseboard border would be essentially the same throughout and that most of the freewheeling creativity would happen on the ceilings.

The measuring, calculating and figuring out of logistics began.  The numbers were huge.  Over a thousand feet of baseboard border, eight hundred feet of the ceiling frieze, more than a hundred rolls for the walls alone.  The homeowner ordered two thousand square feet of ceiling papers, medallions, corner pieces, borders and the whole time brainstorming about ways to combine patterns, fool the eye by reversing pattern directions, creating bold splashes of color when least expected.  The homeowner didn’t want to use the star paper because he thought it looked cheap but the installer told him it would make the ceilings look incredible if we combined it properly and he relented.  A number of ideas seemed set in stone in minds and yet they were totally changed once the project got going.  In the end, the project used nearly three hundred rolls.  The job took exactly six weeks from start to finish.

The installer had only done a handful of Bradbury and Bradbury jobs before this one but the techniques used were the same ones that had been used previously.  At the end of this job, the installer asked the homeowners if they were happy with everything.  She nodded and smiled and he just stood there with tears in his eyes.  He finally said it was everything he had ever dreamed it would be, only better. 

2007 Contest

Entry forms for the 2007 Winning Walls With Wallcovering contest will be available in the Spring of 2007.