Bookcase Update- DIY Fabric Wallpaper Project

Still working away at our home decorating finish-upstairs project. Today The Mr Man painted some more walls whilst I indulged in a bit of fabric "wallpapering". I attacked some backs of some shelves to add some more colour. Because, as Iris says, "More is More, less is a bore". A good quote to live by when decorating I think ;)

Image created by Kenzie Elston, via Lori Siebert

I shun the home decorating "rules". I have four pendant lights upstairs- three of them being a different design. The only people we need to make happy are ourselves in this house; I do not care if someone walks into our house and doesn't like what they see. They don't live here ;)

So, the fabric wallpapering project! I've seen this idea floating around before on Pinterest and was very curious to see how well it worked. Conclusion? Big thumbs up! It's easy, I had everything I needed already at home, and it provides a quick effective update for little effort.

Idea found at How about Orange. I changed the recipe a little, to simplify it a bit.

Get yourself a 500ml (17 ounce) jug or bowl that can withstand boiling water. Whisk 1/4 cup of cornstarch/cornflour with around 1/2 a cup of water (I didn't bother measuring the water here). Then fill to the 500ml level with boiling water & whisk again. Leave to cool. I used mine while it was still warm because I am impatient.

My shelves all clean, books removed, and ready to go!

Measure your space to wallpaper and cut your fabric to size. Don't cut any smaller than the area although a couple of times I mis-measured, and a strip of fabric to patch an area goes unnoticed. The fabric will stretch slightly as you apply it so you may need to trim some edges.

I found for these smaller areas I liked to paint the starch mix onto the surface to be covered, then smooth the fabric on from top to bottom and then paint over the top. Some tutorials online suggest washing fabric first, but I used a variety of unwashed fabrics and no colours ran for me. It also works painting the back of the fabric and smoothing on to the surface, but I found this way took a little longer to get all the creases out of the fabric.

For edges, I pressed to the edge, then folded over to make a visible fold to cut along. You just peel the fabric back, cut, then replace. You could also draw with a pencil first for more accuracy.

Then, give the top a coat of the starch mix, pushing little creases and air bubbles out to the side with your paintbrush.

The starch dries totally clear and matte, so it just looks like the fabric did in the first place, not darkened at all.

Before

After

Apparently this comes off easily when you're tired of the look, although I haven't tested that yet.

I put fabric behind the shelves of this buffet, and the bookcase surrounding our tv. It's brightened things up and I'm always happy with more colour around me. 

So, happy with my project, especially the righthand side bookshelf of the tv unit, which has a nice rainbow effect.

Jules :)