So, um, I really hope this is one of those photos I’m going to look back on in a few years and have a good laugh at how revolting my beautiful bathroom used to be back in 2007:
Yeah. Today we pulled off the rest of the masonite paneling from the walls, revealing (of course) more of that rock-hard mastic that was smeared all over the beautiful old beadboard wainscotting during a previous owner’s awful attempt at renovation.
After much struggling with rusted screws, we also managed to pull up the plywood subfloor. The original floorboards were rotted pretty badly around the drains and had to go. At this point, it looks like we’ll either be trying to do a patch to match the remaining, intact boards (which are 7/8″ thick and apparently not something you can just pick up at Lumber Liquidators), or we’ll just have to replace ALL of the flooring with new pine boards. Either way, the finished floor will mostly likely be painted wood.
Tomorrow’s plan is to try experimenting with both Peel-Away 7 and Citristrip to see if that beadboard can be salvaged. Fingers crossed.
4 Comments
WOW! I’m stunned! I had no idea it was going to be like this. Don’t you wish you could go back in time and smack people upside the head and say “Don’t do this!!” “Leave it the way it is!!” So much of my house is a lot of the same way, beautiful things covered up and or destroyed by bad past decorating choices.
With the peel away.. leave it on longer than they say to, it will do a much better job……
i speak from experience (stripping the baseboards and crown molding from 4 rooms and a 60-foot long hallway) that peelaway 7 (and only that kind) is the way to go. it is an absolutely astonishing product that works very well on old buildings and can literally remove a dozen coats of paints (including lead varieties) … without the fumes. leave it on for about 6 -8 hours (but not much longer), then scrape it off, scrub the surface and clean. and make sure it’s peelaway 7. it’s well worth the money. we went through about 3-4 gallons of the stuff.
oh, and if you run out of their special paper (goes over the product while it’s working), conventional freezer paper works just as well.