Since my wallpaper idea for the studio bathroom turned out to be disastrous (you can read about that here), I spent some time yesterday thinking of a new idea for the walls. While I thought about some ideas, I worked on removing the wallpaper from the walls and then finishing installing the wainscoting. I added all the trim and am very happy with the result.
I think once everything is primed and painted white (my preferred white is Behr Polar Bear) it will look great.
I’m really glad I chose this simple design instead of looking for a new tile. I think any tile would have looked very elaborate in the wall design. And even though I wasn’t sure about the wall design when I installed this paneling, I knew one thing for sure. The wall design would include lots of color. That’s why it was important to me to keep the lower part of the walls as calm and neutral as possible. I also figured out how to cut around the outlet but didn’t have time to finish that yesterday.
Now I need to sand the wood filler off the nail holes and then have the new trim caulked, primed and painted. So at least the bottom half of the walls are almost finished.
After taking the time to think about some wall ideas, I sat down at my desk and started sketching out some patterns I had come up with. And I’ll show you why I do mockups. An idea can seem so great in my head, but once I create a model, I can actually see if that idea actually works.
The main idea I kept thinking about was to divide the upper walls into thirds and then paint vertical stripes in all the colors of the wallpaper. But once I created the model, I realized that probably wouldn’t work. I thought the squares looked busy (but I love the busyness of squares), but this design looked too busy even for me.
I thought I could tame the design a bit by adding white lines between the colors, but this had the opposite effect. Adding white made it seem even busier.
I just tried it on the bathroom walls to see how it would look. Of course, I’ll have a large 36″ round mirror on the wall and also put artwork on at least one wall (behind the toilet), but even with large portions of the wall covered, that was still too busy for me.
Another idea I wanted to try was adding white lines between the colors of my original square design. I liked it when I saw it like that…
But when I hung it on the walls, I wasn’t entirely sure. It almost looks like grouted tiles, and I don’t want my walls to look like tiles. On the other hand, I like the brightness that the white gives to the design. It actually looks busier than the original design, although it doesn’t seem nearly as busy as the vertical stripes with white lines.
But comparing it to the original design, I think I’m still leaning towards this one.
There is something about this design that seems more pleasing to my eye without the white lines.
Here the two are next to each other.
I’ll be honest. I was really hoping this would work with the white lines because it would be MUCH easier and quicker to paint. I could tape all the squares in one step with 1/4 inch painter’s tape and then paint the squares in one step. Without the white lines separating the squares, certain squares will need to be taped off, painted, and allowed to dry. Then tape off more squares, paint them and let them dry. I have to do this over and over again until they are all painted. But I think it will be worth it to get the look I want.
So after all this exercise I’m back to the original design…in color. I have no idea how long it will take me to paint all of these squares, but I’m up for the challenge. I’ve done much more lengthy painting projects before, so painting squares can be very relaxing and fun. All I have to do is find a really good, long podcast to listen to, put my headphones on to drown out all the distractions, and keep myself busy.
