Installing Peel & Stick Grasscloth on Our Built-in’s

I seriously love grasscloth. If our walls weren’t composed of century old plaster, there would definitely be a room covered in the textured perfection from top to bottom. Since a wallpapered room isn’t in my future at the moment I decided to try this easy peel and stick option I found on Amazon for the back of our built-ins. When it arrived in the mail I was pleasantly surprised — it has a nice weight to it, is actually textured and could easily pass as legit grass cloth if you don’t have your nose pressed up to it.

what you’ll need

Peel & stick grasscloth wallpaper (I used 1 1/2 rolls)
Scissors
Plastic wallpaper smoothing tool or spatula
Razor blade or precision knife
Measuring tape

First, you will want to determine your starting place. Grass cloth should be installed with the grass texture running horizontally; it would be tempting to install the wallpaper the opposite way with the texture running vertically (you would have less waste), but keeping it looking as authentic as possible is the goal. The width of my shelves needed more than two sheets, so I decided to center the first piece and add a piece to the left and right. Another thing to note — I prefer to have mismatched seams between separate pieces of grasscloth rather than matching the seams on the repeat. You do what you prefer!

Next, cut individual pieces of the wallpaper for between each shelf by measuring the space between two shelves and adding 1-2 inches to the overall length. I had the best luck cutting as straight of a line as I could so that the top of my pieces would need little to no trimming, and I could leave all of the excess at the bottom after installing each piece. I didn’t want to accidentally cut into my paint finish so I aimed for the least amount of trimming possible.

Once you have your pieces cut to size you can start installing! I started by peeling the entire backing off of each piece and getting each piece lined up at the top of each section. I didn’t have a plastic knife or wallpaper installer, so I just used a plastic spatula from my kitchen:

Once your piece is installed with all air bubble pushed out, trim all sides with your blade or knife. Be careful not to cut into your paint finish! This wallpaper was really easy to work with. If I had to remove a piece to reposition it I could easily take it off and reapply again. I ended up going through about 1 1/2 rolls for my built in shelves.

And that’s it! This was one of the most satisfying updates I’ve made to our house in a long time. This paper was super easy to work with and I love the texture it adds to our shelving.

If you try this for yourself let me know in the comments below — I’d love to hear about it. Happy wallpapering!