I would think you would need a skim coat before you paint, but I suppose it depends on how much texture you want. Sounds like you have been having fun, haha.

Nancy

OMG I feel your pain.

Question. Is the woodwork in the room painted, or is it stained? Let me tell you why I ask.

We moved into our current house last June. One of the bathrooms gave me a very difficult time stripping the wallpaper. Took me weeks of gumption to finally finish. Then when I primed the walls (after a half A&$ skim coat of the bad damage) the primer-sealer wouldn't stick in some areas. How strange. I google, and it seems that the stained woodwork was the problem. Because when the house was built, they stained the woodwork, and then oversprayed it with the shellac. Then they put up the wall paper (with no seizing of course). So the primer couldn't stick to the wall right by the trim because of the shellac. So I had to get a different primer ($60 a gallon) that was designed to seal over the shellac. Luckily that worked for me. So just to make you aware so you can be on the lookout for this issue.

Gardz will seal the glue. Won't fix your walls though. If you want smooth walls you may have to skim coat as springroz suggested. Then Gardz, just to be sure...

In my experience, any glue left on the walls will bubble up after you paint, so you need to be sure it is all off. The best recommendation I have, which I received from a painter who has worked in our home and is meticulous, is to use coarse steel wool to 'wash' the walls. Wet the wall and then go over and over with the coarse steel wool and you will be amazed at what it will remove in the way of glue. Good luck.

I've sanded in the past after wallpaper removal, but the steel wool sounds even better.

One thing I learned after removing wallpaper and sanding etc, is that paint highlights every single blemish. If you think you have it looking smooth, after its painted you may not think so as much. So prep, prep, prep.

A coat of primer is essential. I always use Benjamin Moore Fresh Start. Not familiar with Gardz. Spackle and sand any holes and gaps. Spackle shrinks, so may need two applications. I recall some aggressive wallpaper removal where I made knicks in the drywall, but it is pretty easy to touch them up.

And matte paint is probably a good idea.

It's been a while since I did wallpaper stripping. IIRC the product I used for the final cleaning was TSP (trisodium Phosphate, I believe). It is a powder or granule that is mixed with warm/hot water and worked well for me in removing the glue. You should be able to find at hardware, wallpaper/paint stores or maybe HD or Lowes.

TSP is banned in many areas now.

I always used DIF (diluted with warm water) wallpaper removal solution to remove the glue. Apply the solution so it saturates the wall. Let it soak in for a while. Then wipe off with lots of clean water. Work on a small area at a time. Rinse your rag quite often.

I had a dining room that was completely papered by a builder. No proper prep work was done. We used the water and vinegar method for both the paper and the backing. And I know this will be hard to believe, but we used credit cards to remove it. Not our real ones, but those that come in the mail with the cc offers. They were small enough to control and didn't gouge the walls. Tedious, yes. But it worked. The metal scrapers were gouging the walls.

The good news is that a lot of the new wallpapers are guaranteed to come off completely in one piece.

Good luck!

I can at least understand a fraction of your pain. When I redid two of my bathrooms I'd noticed that the painted walls previously had some areas that looked crackled. Once I got up on a stool and started sanding I realized there was a huge amount of glue residue under the paint. I soaked it with water and a sponge and used a putty knife to scrape. I ended up smoothing it out a little with mud before priming and painting. But I don't know that the technique works for a whole room. So about all I can offer other than that is sympathy and encouragement that you'll be so happy with the result when you're done.

BTDT many times as we used to buy fixers and I've stripped a lot of wallpaper. In one house the wallpaper had been applied directly on the wallboard with no paint or primer under. That took a long time to remove without completely ruining the wallboard and DH skim coated then primed with Prime-it. We used Prime-it for many projects as it really is a good primer. Used to smell awful, I wonder if they've improved that.

Here is a link that might be useful: Prime-it

If you have a lot of drywall to touch up, instead of regular spackle, I like to use Ready Patch. HD sells it. It's like ready-to-use joint compound in a small container. Non-shrinking.

http://www.rustoleum.com/product-catalog/consumer-brands/zinsser/patch-and-repair/ready-patch-professional-spackling-and-patching-compound/

A plastic Dobie scrubbing pad from the grocery
Safe-n-Simple
Finish with GARDZ per recommended spread rate, two coats if unsure you're a good enough painter to hit all the spots with 1 coat.

Never use TSP. It requires flood rinsing - like only you can do outside.

Typical water-based primers are all about PREPARING the surface so a new coat will stick OVER it. They are not about sealing in anything UNDER. In addition, water-based primer will reactivate glue residue. Think about how the glue was activated to stick in the first place? With water. A water based primer over the glue means you may as well not even bother priming. GARDZ does not reactivate remnants of residual glue rather it seals in any traces of residual glue.

Safe-n-Simple and a plastic scrubby + elbow grease will get all that is possible to get off the walls leaving no damage behind.

Did I mention you need to use GARDZ ? :)

This post was edited by funcolors on Fri, Jan 31, 14 at 0:23

I found the Gardz yesterday (my local Ben Moore paint supplier had it) and applied. My next concern is where the border was applied. The wall looks like orange peel --I guess that it is glue? Does this mean I need to do a skim coat? Another question: the border was placed at chair rail height and the wallpaper was beneath it. Should I skim coat the entire wall or can I simple skim coat the area where the wallpaper was? Thanks for all your help and experience.

This is my NIGHTMARE!! I have one room left in my 1970's ranch--the master-- all walls in flowered paper. DH refused to help me move the furniture to begin the job because he anticipates the paper WILL NOT COME OFF--wall board ruined etc.
If your wall board was damaged yes you HAVE TO skim coat it before any painting... The amount of water and elbow grease this job will take has kept it at the bottom of the jar for 15 years...I would paint over it but it is vinyl and slick and that too would be a disaster. The amount of glue left behind in past jobs really makes me hate wall paper and anyone who applies it to a home they will EVER sell. Wall paper glue is why faux painting was invented. Good for you forging ahead. I wish I could say my job was where yours is now!!

I believe if you're seeing something that looks like orange peel, then it's probably glue residue. Based on my experience of painted walls showing the crackling of the glue underneath, I would highly recommend you get all of that glue off of the wall before you prime and paint.