Blackbirds

 

Monday morning found us in Chilliwack working with a specialized wallpaper and then some Grass Cloth. I was only told that the paper was non-pasted so not knowing anything else about it, I quoted an hourly rate instead of guessing at the time involved. Good thing!

 

This material came untrimmed and un-pasted. The end result was supposed to look like a mural so pattern match was and was not an issue. The seams all met on the black tree trunk but the birds could not line up in rows. Making our own seams on a black background does not work so each panel had to be overlapped and double cut, care being given to keep the tree trunk as wide as possible and as much like the next one as possible. After a few pieces this paper was stressing me out.

 

Because the tree trunks were so pronounced, we had to map out the room before we installed the first piece as it was important to know where each and every tree trunk would be in relation to the corners and the window. To make things extra challenging, it was a reno of an older home and the corners were not plumb or square.

 

Four hours later, the customer was very pleased with the result and I was pretty proud of most of what we had done. Time will tell if anyone else has a paperhanger's eye and spots the small mistakes I made.

 

Note the window framed by tree trunks and tree trunks centered on all the walls. This was partly planning and mostly luck. I hung something similar, but with Peacocks, in a psychologist's office and was instructed to be very certain that there was not one single Peacock's head cut off at the neck as it would freak out some of her clients. I got lucky on that one too because once you start, the pattern is set and it will come out how it comes out.

 

One last thing to do on this job was to hang two panels of Grass Cloth on a sheet of primed MDF, which was to  be mounted on the wall as a backdrop for some kind of Chinese artwork. That took about ten minutes and then we were off to another job off Annis Road in Chilliwack. We will be there for quite some time.