Red & White Wallpaper in Old House

Posted on | November 6, 2009 | 9 Comments

I’m so happy to share my friend Heidi’s lovely living room wallpaper. Heidi lives just down the street from me in an old house too. Her house is adorable filled with old house nooks and beautiful wallpaper. The wallpaper in her living room is my favorite. A great pattern with a little pop of color.

This afternoon, I came across the source of Heidi’s adorable wallpaper (thanks jennifer condon!) My first thought, I can have her wallpaper too? You can see the print as well as few other very historic new england designs at waterhousewallhangings.com.

Above a photo of her living room perfectly decorated to fit the small space. How gorgeous are her floors? Below the wallpaper in a reverse colorway. Check out waterhousewallhangings.com for purchasing information.

Do you have an old home you would like to share? Send me an e-mail at elliott.katy@gmail.com.

Category: interiors, living room, marblehead, wallpaper

Comments

9 Responses to “Red & White Wallpaper in Old House”

mopar
November 6th, 2009 @ 7:19 pm

Love the wallpaper. And yes, those floors do look good. I wonder what she put on them. Pine floors can be tricky.

Ours are being sanded this week. First they are sealing them to even out the tones a little, then putting on Minwax stain in Golden Oak, and then covering with three coats of water-based polyurethane. They sanded and tested five sample stains for us first.

They’re charging about $1.50 per square foot. But if they didn’t put the sealer or the stain on, they might have done it for a $1 or less per square foot. A friend of mine did his for 80 cents. They don’t seem too worried about the paint, but there isn’t too much of it.
Katy Elliott
November 6th, 2009 @ 7:24 pm

Mopar–I have to ask Heidi if she knows anything about her floors. She bought the house last summer with the floors done.
Kathy G
November 7th, 2009 @ 10:20 am

Love this room…I am fixated on those plaid chairs with the floral tuffet and the topiary in the window.
mopar
November 7th, 2009 @ 11:44 am

Katy, how lucky to find a house with floors that don’t need anything done to them.
Virginia
November 8th, 2009 @ 2:01 pm

We had ours sanded and polyed before we moved in. They’ve remained looking good for the last 5 years. We don’t wear shoes in the house and we don’t have a dog so this helps a lot. The biggest floor wrecker so far is out 1 yr old daughter, she keeps denting the floors whenever she drops her toys.
Heidi
November 9th, 2009 @ 12:25 pm

Hi Katy and mopar-I actually had the floors done between my closing and the day that I moved in. This was the one thing that I knew had to be completed before all of my furniture arrived. I used a local company and since the floors were already in very good shape, they recommended only a light screening and then one application of poly so that they would not be too shiny and in keeping with the age of the house. There was one area (my entrance way) which was discolored from a rug sitting in strong sunlight so that is the only area that I had to sand down to get an even color. However, I wish that I had just left it alone as I now have a rug there as well and the color change would not have been noticeable. In these old houses, it is important to be careful to not sand down too far-you don’t want to expose the nails. Also, as Virginia notes, it is important to remove your shoes as any gravel/stones can do major damage and to put felt pads under furniture. Old pine is very soft and easy to dent. Hope this helps!
Katy Elliott
November 9th, 2009 @ 12:28 pm

Thanks Heidi! Super helpful information!
mopar
November 9th, 2009 @ 4:38 pm

Thank you so much! Hm, the floor guys promised not to sand my floors too much, but then they definitely did expose the nails, at least in one area. They thought this was just fine — that they would then drive the nails in further. I would be very surprised if our floors had been sanded very much in the past, since they appear to have been hidden under carpets and linoleum since they were laid down in 1897 or so. Thank you so much for this information!
Elizabeth Bolton
January 3rd, 2010 @ 1:50 am

Hi Katy, I’m delighted to find all your wallpaper posts and love the one you’ve shown here. It’s always nice to actually see these patterns full size on a wall.

I’ve been on historic wallpaper quests since I bought my first old house. I guesss I shouldn’t be surprised that you’ve got so much about wallpaper on your site. Marblehead is a hotbed of beautiful wallpaper. I went on the house tour last month and coming from the land of the painted wall (Cambridge) it was a real treat to see all the classic patterns. It inspired a wallpaper post on my own blog as a matter of fact.

Really enjoy your site.

Liz