Off the Wall Painting

So, what do you do when your dog digs a hole in the office through your carpet to the sub floor? Well, you need to replace the floor, obviously. But, as always, I couldn’t bring myself to simply replace the carpet or put in “normal” flooring. What fun is that?

The office is a small space and mostly occupied by my hubby who works from home. Therefore, why not try something new with the space and experiment with some unique techniques and materials? I looked into many different materials including different plywood techniques and recycled wood but ended up being intrigued by Ashley over at Domestic Imperfections. I read over her Part 1 for the Paper Floor Experiment and I was bursting with inspiration!! You can read all about Ashley’s tips and instructions at her home page: http://www.domesticimperfection.com– she is amazing! Thank you Ashley!!!

At this point, I am so excited to have settled on the technique for the office floor but the verdict was still out on what materials I was going to use. I liked the look of the craft paper. It had a rich color and created a warm and cozy feel. However, I wanted to add a geometric pattern to the space to create a unique visual texture. How was I going to do that and what could I use to do it?

Let’s take a few steps back…

When Buddy and I purchased the property across the street, there was an old house included. It was built in 1936 and in pretty bad shape, but was perfect for a studio space. My dad and I decided to tackle ripping up the kitchen floor in the old house to get rid of the four layers of linoleum and clean up the space. Underneath the last layer of linoleum we made quite the discovery – an entire layer of newspapers from April of 1945!!! The history contained in these papers was amazing! Being that WW2 ended within months of these papers being published, the papers were full of war related articles and personal stories, interesting advertisements and photographs. Of course I had to stop ripping up the floor to read them. And carefully stack them…to kept them. Just in case.

Well the “just in case” had arrived!

So…step one…

Ripping up the carpet. This part goes quick, thank goodness.

2. Step 2. Pulling out all the staples and patching holes. I do not have any pictures of this because I do not like to be reminded of this step. I hate it. It is necessary. But I hate it. With. A. Passion.

3. At this point, I wanted to start measuring the floor and laying out the pattern. I had Emersyn measure out 6 inches the entire way around the room to give me an idea of how close to the wall I needed to lay the base layer of newspapers.

3. Using the glue recipe and technique detailed by Ashley at Domestic Imperfections, I cut the newspapers into small pieces and covered the floor with a random pattern. I decided to cut the newspapers with scissors and did not crumple the newspapers like Ashley did with the craft paper. They were a bit too delicate to crumple and I wanted specific articles cut out so I used scissors. The newspapers took a full evening of 90’s music and glue but it was worth it.

Sorry this picture is so dark but it was like 1:00 am when I finished this step! I used a paint tray filled with glue to lay down the newspapers. It helped to have an wide open container to lay the papers in. I then pulled each paper between two fingers to remove excess glue. Also, being that it was a plywood subfloor and full of imperfections, I found it helpful to brush on the glue mixture directly on the wood prior to laying each paper down.

The following day I was able to come into the space and fix any areas that needed a little extra love. Then it was time for me, my measuring tape and my T square to become better friends.

4. For this step, I used a 30″ roll of craft paper. I wanted to put a border around the room. I measured and cut 6inch wide strips of the craft paper but put them aside to do at the end. For the middle of the room, I wanted to do a bold geometric pattern. I cut 4inch strips of the craft paper and created 12inch squares running diagonally throughout the room. I felt the diagonal orientation of the squares added interest to the space and drew your eye into the room. After completing the painstaking measuring and glueing of the pattern, I finished the edges by adding the 6inch border around the room.

5. The final step was applying Poly to the floor. I used Varathane High Traffic Water Based Floor Poly and was very pleased. I put on 4 coats and after three years added a touch up coat and am happy with how it is holding up. Here is the link:

https://www.rustoleum.com/pages/find-a-product/

This project has become one of my favorite projects! It is like walking into a time capsule and it makes me smile every time I see friends and family lounging out on the office floor reading the articles. Please don’t hesitate to ask questions…I would be happy to help! And again…thanks for checking out my latest article!