Wallpapering & Wallpaper Hanging in Burwell

Wallpapering older Burwell walls

Walls in the village's oldest houses are rarely flat. Clunch was quarried locally from 1252 to 1952, and plaster in houses that age has usually been patched many times, which shows through a finish paper. We fill and make good, then hang lining paper, cross-lined if needed, so the decorative paper goes onto an even surface that absorbs paste at the same rate everywhere.

Historic England lists 59 buildings in the parish, and parts of the village fall in the Burwell High Town and Burwell North Street conservation areas. Owners of a listed house should talk to East Cambridgeshire District Council before historic finishes come off. Any old paper you're keeping is protected while we work.

Feature walls, stairwells and whole rooms

The single biggest building period in Burwell is 1993 to 1999, about 480 homes. Walls of that age are usually flatter, so one feature wall behind a bed, on a chimney breast or up a stairwell is often enough. Simon, our wallpaper specialist, plans where each repeat falls before he cuts the first length.

Larger rooms use a lot of rolls, and with 34% of homes here having four or more bedrooms, papering a whole house can be a sizeable order. We measure and work out roll numbers from the pattern repeat, so you don't run short. Our page on designer and William Morris papers covers costly papers in more depth.

How we approach wallpapering

We'd strip old layers with care, wash off the paste and check how sound the plaster is underneath. Blown patches go to Lewis, our plasterer, to skim. Then we line where needed, size if the maker recommends it, and hang from a plumb line, setting the pattern out from the wall you see first on entering the room. The full method, products and FAQs are on our wallpapering page.