One of the first projects we’ve been working on in the new house is the master bathroom… And when I say “master,” I’m being generous! In fact, there’s nothing generous about it. It’s pretty small, and as it is right now, there is a tiny pedestal sink with a cracked sink, and some builder-grade white boring-as-can-be tiles on the floor, and some sage green sleepy wallpaper all over the place! Yea, not really a master bath!

It will never be a large bathroom (unless we move some walls around, which is not in our immediate future), but it still can seem more regal, inviting and high-end. And that’s exactly what we intend to do. The first job to tackle in that space was to remove the wallpaper. Here it is in all its…ahem… glory!

And here is one of the many seams!

Natural Wallpaper Stripper

So we knew some of the commercially-available wall paper strippers out there are pretty caustic, corrosive and generally toxic. Not stuff I like to bring into my house- especially with two little terrors under 4 running around all day! I knew buying one of those commercial products would be a last resort for us.

I also knew some people have said that their wall paper just peels off ever so easily! I figured that would worth a try, and lo and behold, the wall paper peeled off in impressively & satisfyingly large sheets! We got (I would estimate) about 70% of the paper off the wall this way! Whew- what great luck!

Then, for the remaining 30% of the wallpaper, which seemed to be stuck on too much, the peeling method seemed to fail. When you peeled it off, it just broke into tiny pieces and tiny strips. Way too time-consuming to keep that up. It seems in those areas, the wallpaper adhesive was too strong… What to do, what to do!

I figured I would spray some vinegar directly on the wallpaper, in an effort to dissolve and soften the adhesive. I left it on for 5-10 minutes, and then grabbed one of those metal putty knives, and started scraping. Again, I was so pleased to see the wall paper scrape right off. It was not that bad!

And I would much rather use vinegar than any of those caustic strippers available at the home improvement stores. Who knew? Vinegar has so many uses around the house, and now wall paper stripper can be added to that list! And here is the room after we took the wallpaper off… those walls still need some work!

Ever wanted to learn Arabic online? Check out Arabic Road & learn Arabic on your own terms.

Disclosure: Engineer Mommy is a participant in the Amazon Services, LLC Associates Program, which is an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to amazon.com. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. For additional details, please see our full Disclosure Policy. Any link may be an affiliate link. All opinions are exclusively my own.